Karaoke Forums

I would be curious to see people's perceptions of how karaoke has changed since it began. My guess is that at first, there was only a limited number of songs. Were they mostly pop, rock, country, r&B...spread out evenly? And how quickly did it change? For example, did pop grow the fastest, or maybe did a lot of country get added in at a certain point? My guess is that the first shows had singers singing a variety of songs--songs were being released at a rapid pace, and people were singing just about anything that came out, so there was a wide variety of genre's being covered at the earlier karaoke shows. It seems that it would take awhile (several years) before you could build up enough songs to have a mostly country show, or a mostly rock show, so in a way, karaoke probably mimicked what AM radio was like in the 70's--a smorgasborg of songs and genres from a diversity of artists.

Now that there are a large number of songs available, the shows, I suspect, are starting to fragment, much like radio did, and karaoke shows are becoming more niche--you can have a mostly country show, a mostly rock show, or a mostly r&b show, or even a new-releases show of any genre. Heck, an aspiring kj could probably have and all jazz/showtunes show, or even an all ballads show if they knew their clientele well!

I started singing roughtly about 2000-2001. I remember one night I was at a karaoke bar, and a bunch of singers were talking of going to another karaoke show at a place called the China Garden in Renton. Evidently this was going to be the last night that the China Garden was open. The people asked me if I wanted to go, but I declined, not really knowing much about the China Garden and probably already having a song slip or two in at the place we were presently at (never give up your spot in the rotation, right?). Ultimately though, I regretted not going, because later it seemed to me that a chapter of karaoke history was closing. The China Garden turned out to be a locally famous (i.e. in South Seattle, Skyway, and Renton) place. It had had karaoke 7 nights a week. It seemed like every karaoke singer I talked to after that at any karaoke bar had sung at the China Garden, and everyone regretted its closing. Why it actuallyl closed I never figured out as it had been extremely popular. But after it closed, the crowd that went there splintered off into groups that went in different geographical directions to other karaoke shows, so things basically fragrmented...except people would continually bump into friends at bars and the one thing they had in common was....they had all sung at the China Garden! Maybe one or two people on this board know about this place?

I mention the China Garden, because I think it's closure kind of signified the transition when shows were changing more from a smorgasborg sing-anything type, to more niche style show--country, r&B, rock, or even what is called a "high energy" show, which also seems to me to be kind of a niche style show, though fairly prevalent.

It's interesting to be living through something where one can see both it's beginning, and some of it's development. So, for those of you who've been singing awhile, what is your perspective? Is the above narration an accurate description of karaoke history?

I was introduced to karaoke about 89. Back then - around here anyway - were only cassette format with printed lyric sheets. You picked out a song & when your name was called you came up to sing & read off the sheet that the host handed you. About 90 is when we had a couple companies using the Pioneer LaserKaraoke discs, videos on a tv with a highlighting lyric that you sang along to. On the flipside to that was also CDG karaoke with DK being the primary runner at that time. These were the 2 major players at the time as far as video karaoke went. Singing Machine, Priddis, Music Maestro, Sound Choice were still up & coming but still only producing tapes.
At this point the libraries were fairly small - probably no more than 1000-1500 songs for a LARGE library if you actually combined both formats available - which wasn't really done at that time. Come about 93 is when SC, MM, and a handful of others really started pumping out the cdg's of their libraries. Cheaper than laserdiscs (which were going for approx $150 per disc for 30 songs), had decent music quality for the most part & came out with alot more newer/current songs as the other 2 main libraries only ran up until later 80's with very few current hits of the time - lots of 50's-80's music, country & standard type stuff like from Sinatra, Dean MArtin, etc., not a lot of heavy rock and again, no real current 'hits' of the day..
Pioneer still produced laserdiscs up until about 96 or so & DK topped their intial library out at 99 discs around 97 or so.

Back when I first started really going out in 90, everyone that was there, was there to sing. Everyone applauded everyone - good, bad or indifferent, just to get up & sing was good enough to applaud. There was not a ton of chatter during performances as people were actually focusing on the singers, all eyes were directed to the stage the majority of the time.

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I concur. I believe it was around '92 when I started and a beginniing system would cost $7500.00 or more. For me the kj used all the pioneer laser discs which took forever to change but no one noticed back then as it was normal.

There are definately more songs as well as choices of manufacturer's which is good for us. This has increased the quality of songs being made as well as selection. Even with all the new songs, it is usually all the same songs being sung by the same singers night after night.

It seemed it was less "look at me sing" as it was more about having fun.

I remember that the bartender hated karaoke but that was the only time the bar was packed.

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Kevin

Even though I know the published "History of Karaoke", I sang along with the bouncing ball at Saturday matinees at the theater..

Right after the Cowboy serial..

JDmeister, I remember Sing A Long With Mitch on the Mitch Miller Show. It was on TV in the early 60s and you sang as the bouncing ball bounced over each word. Mitch was a band leader back in the day and looked like a beatnik (Ed Roth?) with his goatee. My intro to karaoke was in 84. We used 8-tracks with printed lyric sheets. i think I had purchased maybe four cartridges with four songs each. Singing machine was the only supplier in those days. I remember one host had the oldest equipment I ever saw. Looked like a home stereo amp/reciever. Had a window with lighted squares that moved in and out with the music. You had to set the sound with a small screwdriver through holes in the back. This same host used this same machine as an amp for DJing cruise nights until it finally gave up the ghost about two years ago. Talk about quality! He still hosts at a biker bar near here and has his old cassettes and CDG songs too. It's weird to see singers go up and use the monitor screen and then switch to a song with printed sheets...but that's the way he rolls.

I think I paid nearly $7500 JUST for my 60 laser discs. That was about 1600 songs. I was one of the first around here to run 2 players so one was always cued up - no down time between singers. It was a MAJOR draw at the time - about 94.
Most companies also just plugged the mics into the players running into a very basic "karaoke" amp. Very few were running actual PA gear which is where I really wanted to be different when I started out. I started my company in 94 after working with other companies since 91.

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in the UK i remember the the arbiter player.... a kind of self contained karaoke player rather like a jukebox...plug n play..tho in those days i was very much a customer and not a KJ so I dont know a lot about it...

DK had a similar type of machine where all the discs were loaded in it & it was all punch in the number & play. It was a pretty big since it had the amp & basic mixer built in, size of a small refrigerator.
I also remember the first JVC machines (and DK players if I recall correctly) had an impose feature where you could hook up outside video sources to underline the words. Many places utilized a camera placed on the singer, others just played movies in the background - either way it was cool at the time, but pretty cheesy thinking back now.

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Lon, you HAVE been around a long time.

I started back in '90. My first karaoke player was a Big Echo (I think Sony made it). It had a nice feature on it that started the music right away, elimimating the 6 second silence at the begining of each song. You got a free CD-G player when you bought a full set of DK's. (33 disks at the time). My second player was a Denonet. It played both CD-G's and Lasers. I remember it was big and heavy. It also had a feature where you could superempose another background behind the words. One night I ran X rated videos behind the words on the singers screen. Talk about not being able to follow the words. Ohhhh my what fun. Another player was the Pioneer 5 disk carrousel player. Another big, heavy one.

Sound Choice wasn't making CD-G's yet, and before they actually began production, they sent out a trial CD-G to all their customers asking for their feedback on the background color, the font, and the scrolling. From that feedback they decided on the color scheme that thay are using now. I've still got that trial disk somewhere.

When Sound Choice reached their first 100 disks, they sent out a special free disk to their customers. This disk was never for sale, and had songs that were not available at the time. Still got that one too. I bought the famous Eagles disk when it first came out.

Manufactures were not even thinking about putting out current hits. That was a big deal when that started happening. Pop Hits Monthly I think.

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My first choice IS Sound Choice.

This thread is so interesting. It's bringing back a lot of memories and yes you all are making me feel old. Lon you have the memory of an elephant. I'm amazed sometimes how you remember disc numbers etc...

I started in the 90s also, but only remember CDGs. Oooh there was some really bad karaoke back in the day.

The biggest thing that has changed for me is the quality of singers and their knowledge. People are more apt to know a good show when they see one and serious karaoke singers will go from bar to bar to find it. People have their own collections of CDGs and know what manus they like and don't. We have a karaoke shop in the area that just sells CDGs. Not to mention you now can get them at Walmart, Best Buy etc... Parents are buying cheap setups for their kids and they even have a camera on them so the kids can watch themselves sing. Karaoke has come a long way !

I still have a mix of different genres sung. It doesn't seem like it has turned to genre specific any where in my area, but Chicago is a huge melting pot.

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Yeah I sent in my $5 for shipping as well for the Milestone disc, and they were out - since they were limited production. They never did refund my $5
I have my Eagles 8125 too.

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I think the abundance and availability of home systems has done a couple of things: One, it has allowed singers to get more serious because they have the ability to actually practice their own songs at home; secondly, we may have actually suffered a decrease in singers because if someone has a great home system, they may have house parties and invite singers over -- people still have an audience without the restrictions (overserving, smoking, etc.) and some are too inhibited to sing in public so the house party is the perfect solution.

Of course most people don't spent a HUGE amount of money (I said most, not all) on a home system so they'll still go to where the great sound and atmosphere is.

See what I mean. He's doing it again with the disc numbers.

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[shadow=pink][glow=deepskyblue]. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
[updown]~*~ MONKEY BUSINESS KARAOKE~*~ [/shadow][/updown][/glow]

I think the biggest changes have been, yeah, the change from "lyric sheets" to on screen... and how fast new singles are put out on karaoke. It seems songs come out on cdg before many have gotten familiar with it on radio nowadays.

I first got a home karaoke machine in 1990. It was one of those singing machine ones.. and everything was tape and lyric sheet. I didn't karaoke out live until about 1992-1993. (had small children and didn't frequent bars- rarely at all- in those days)

I thought I was SO high tech when I got my first at-home cdg machine:)

I recall my first hearing about it... an ex-boyfriend came over and told me he had a tape he wanted me to hear, I figured it was him and his guitar. So the music to "Grandpa" by the Judds started out, and when I heard his voice I was like "wtf? how'd you do this?"... he told me it was "called karaoke", he had had it recorded at a booth at the county fair. Wow, what a long time ago:)

As Lon said though, I do recall the early years in bars, it seemed the main focus was hearing whoever was up next. People would actually "be quiet" to hear the singer, because it was more of a novelty back then.

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