Usher And Shakira Bring Competitive Edge To Judges' Table on 'The Voice'

Music superstars, Usher, 34, and Shakira, 35, will replace Cee-Lo Green, 38, and Christina Aguilera, 32, on NBC’s The Voice next season. Blind auditions were recently filmed, and from the looks of it, there will be more fierceness in the competition.

"I would say the competitiveness is up," returning judge, Blake Shelton, 36, told RollingStone.com. "We've replaced Cee Lo with somebody that's just that much more aggressive. And Christina was always competitive, [but] now you've got four that are just killers up here."

Shakira has always been hands-on in her approach as an artist, and will look to impart that wisdom onto her team. "While I'm coaching my team I tend to focus on the detail. I don't know if it's maybe because of the female condition, but men are more focused on the general aspects, and women tend to sort of focus on details a lot,” she said. “And so when I'm giving directions to my contestants I'm particularly focused on details.”

Usher, who has already mentored Justin Bieber, 18, in the real world, brings experience in coaching and guiding a musician into superstar status. It also doesn’t hurt that he himself started out on a talent show similar to this one. “The one thing that I hope is to come into this show and be able to score an incredible entertainer that people will talk about for years and years and track it back," he says. “I am kind of a living example of that. I started on Star Search, and my career kind of launched from there.”

Currently, there is no timetable for how long these new judges will last on the show. “Everybody can't coach for life," said executive producer Mark Burnett, "because when you have people with current recording in the game, this is not their job. Their job is their fans and making music and being live, and so we knew from the beginning that this would happen. They all have another life and their schedules.”

Watch the promo video for The Voice's upcoming season below.