Karaoke Forums

Every now and then something happens. I wouldn't let it bother me, unless it happened repeatedly, in which case it might be time to re-evaluate your show or the venue to try to find out why. Is it me? Is the venue doing something to upset the people? Etc., that caused them to quit coming. These evaluations should be going on constantly anyway, just to keep up with what's happening. But, sometimes s#1t happens. When it does, deal with it. If it happens too often start looking for another venue.

Private parties are notorious for this sort of thing simply because the guests have not come specifically for karaoke so you've got to expect it.
Be prepared!

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Imagine!

Okay... the newbie's gonna throw his $0.03 in...

I got into The Business kinda "sideways" - having always had a love of music - and a love of lighting and technology. Time and perseverence have given me a nice little business that seems to want to grow. A recent addition was Karaoke - we went live 11/01/03 with 2.5hrs of Karaoke at the tail end of a wedding reception.

It went over better than we ever could have expected! We're working from our custom-built computer system that's loaded with over 23,000 songs and about 12,750 Karaoke tunes (MANY $ spent on SC and CB library discs and more hours of ripping than I care to think about!!!).

With this powerful piece of hardware at my fingertips, Samson corded mics all around, a Mackie DFX mixer and SRM-450 speakers I was able to throw a show that they're still talking about. I'll also throw a plug in here for the Peavey Feedback Ferrit II - though we only got it partially configured for the room (this was its first show in our rig - brought on-board specifically to handle the worst feedback situations imaginable - multi-mic karaoke!) it worked WONDERS for killing the noise - especially when the singers would walk in front of the speakers with their open mics (no feedback AT ALL!).

All things considered, we had about 4 strong singers in a party of ~300 and probably 20-25 people total sang. And when no one would step up? I played music - immediately. A quick announcement in my best DJ/emcee voice and a push of two buttons (one to start the track playing and another to get the lights moving) and the evening continued smoothly and flawlessly. As soon as a singer dropped their tracks off I cued up their next song and waited for the music to end, then announced them and away we went - again smoothly.

I should point out that, at that particular juncture in time, I'D NEVER SEEN A KJ AT WORK. What I did was all improv on-the-spot. I should also mention that, for the present, I'm unable to carry a tune in a bucket (though I hope to be singing somewhat respectably in the next few months - I just gotta get some practice in). I had to rely on wits, music knowledge and the fact that my tracks are instantly available to me.

I can see where being able to sing would be beneficial to pushing your show, but I've not come across a situation where it's been a make/break deal for me and I've done a number of shows now (though by no means do I lay any sort of claim to being more knowledgeable than my current limited experience warrants). I -have- gone out and lip-synced a few tunes (with props) much to the crowd's delight - but I'm also quick to point out that I'm doing it this way to "spare them the terror" - it makes a great running joke (especially since I can crack my voice and do character voices easily).

Don't be damning all the DJ's - just because we don't run exclusively Karaoke shows doesn't make us all clueless. I wouldn't give up my computer and my non-Karaoke music library for anything - it's saved me more than once when the going's gotten rough!

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DJ Shadowfax

I don't think you'll find many people here running down dj's. A lot of our regulars DJ and KJ both. What ya will find is KJ's demanding the same professional respect as DJ's. I know DJ's that say they never have or never care to KJ. I know KJ's that never want to DJ. I know people who do both and love both. Its all a matter of what turns ya on.

As far as how that wedding went - great! Stick around here for a while and you'll find some really great people.

Exactly!..... Ron!