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I've got to be more careful about slip cutoff time. Nice thing about Hoster is the indicator that gives you the total minutes of the songs you have queued - I just have to remember to look at it more often. Really helps to look at the total minutes of queued singers and the clock - I figure if at 11:30 I've got 1:33 minutes worth of songs queued, I'm not going to take more slips. I do count on a certain amount of attrition as the night comes to a close - many people leave before closing time which will allow someone who may not have even thought of singing to put a song up.

New singers first time through is my rotation - as long as someone walks in during the first round, they are put at the end. Once I go back to the beginning of the rotation, and when new singer present slips, I start "slipping" them in every 3-4 singers. I don't make new singers wait too long - can't risk them getting flustered and leaving.

Do you let entire songs play through or do you fade out once a singer sets the mic down & walks away.

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Now I wouldn't mind you cutting off taking any new slips after 11:30 if you had enough slips to finish out the show. I wish EVERY KJ did it that way but they don't. If I showed up at 11:45 and was told that you were all filled up and I probably wouldn't get to sing; I would be fine with that as long as it applied to everyone. The problem is that most people KJ's don't stop taking slips EVER and they keep putting the "new" singers in within 4 or 5 songs and people who should have gotten to sing one more time don't get to sing one more time. If you've got 22 song slips from 22 different people at 11:30 PM and your show ends at 1:00; I believe that those 22 people that have been at your show all night should get the remaining 22 song slots. I don't think that a KJ should start putting in one new singer in between each "old" singer because then 11 of the "old" singers will get screwed out of their last turn in favor of people who showed up late, for whatever reason. Whenever a singer finishes a song, that singer is put back at the end of the line of singers waiting to sing. A person who walks in at that point should be put behind that person regardless of how long the wait will be(IMHO) If I just got done singing and I'm willing to wait an hour and a half to sing another song; the person who just walked in the door should be willing to wait an hour and a half to sing his next(first) song. If I'm not willing to wait, I can choose to leave just like the new singer can choose to leave. If I was the new singer and I was told that I had to wait, I would come earlier the next time. If I was the new singer and I was put in right away, I would continue showing up late to take advantage of the loop hole in the rotation. If I get there early and I wind up as the 15th person in a 15 person rotation I have to wait for 29 songs to be sung before I sing my second song. If I get there late and the KJ slips me in within a song or two, I only have to listen to 16 or 17 songs before I get to sing my second song. Johnny come lately gets a 12 to 13 song advantage over the person who got there at the beginning of the show. He also winds up in front of everyone else in the rotation that he should be behind. That new singer will get to sing 2 songs out of the next 16 songs and everyone that got there before him will only sing once. Now how is that fair to your loyal following? I just feel that EVERYONE should have to wait the same amount of time to sing a song with no favoritism based on when you get there. Showing up late should not become the incentive. Getting there early should be.

The hole in your reasoning is that if you want to sing, you have to be there when the show starts. I have run a lot of shows - one of my most well attended, everyone DID arrive at the time the show started and I'd often end up with 25 singers. On the other hand, I'm not going to castigate someone who maybe had no control over arriving late (like people who get off at 11 - Boeing workers in our area get off at 11 and often all meet at a bar after work) - am I going to say to them, hey, you didn't get here at 9 so you won't be able to sing? Or you'll have to wait til the end to see if I have time for you?

Again, I think this can all be related to the fact that if a rotation is moving along quickly, and there isn't a lot of dead air time, and the singers are moving up and down off the stage quickly, people don't complain. I believe it is when things get bogged down and there seems to be an interminable time between singers that the natives get restless.

My interspersing method has always worked well, no one has EVER complained about the rotation - they only get to sing quickly upon arrival and then they're back in the rotation with everyone else.

I do, however, ignore a group of drunks who have obviously spent their time and money at another location and think they're going to take over the stage a half hour before the end of the show. Sorry, next time drink/eat/sing here and I'll welcome you with open arms.

I don't want to get into too much of a discussion over this issue - everybody does it differently; the crowd's tolerance for the method determines its success or failure. All I know is in these tough economic times, I don't want to alienate anyone who might come in and spend some money, and thus guaranteeing my longevity at a place.

Once I have enough slips to finish out a show, no one else gets in, including those who didn't give me another slip before I made the call. SO those 22 people would be the ones that sang last. If you have a song up before I make the cut off call, you can pretty much be guaranteed that you will sing it!
If someone that didn't turn in their slip in time tried to afterwards, I may accept the slip & put it at the end & give them the fair warning that they may not get back up as we already have enough to take out the night.

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All things being equal; I would choose to go to Lonnie's show over your show. I don't see how my employment situation should determine whether or not I get bumped up, or down, in the rotation.

Again, all things being equal, lets agree that all customers spend ten dollars per hour at a karaoke show. If I'm the bar owner and I have to annoy one customer, I would choose to annoy the customer who is at my bar for an hour and a half before I annoy the person who is at my bar for 4 to 5 hours EVERY WEEK. The fact that the one person has to work late doesn't enter into my calculations. If that person wants to go to a karaoke bar after work; he or she should be prepared to wait just like everyone else. I'm sure that there is a karaoke bar in the area that is open on this person's NIGHT OFF where he can be treated like everyone else. 40 to 50 dollars in the till is better than 15 dollars in the till. There are shows where I live that I completely avoid because they do what you do Karen. I'm glad that NO ONE has EVER complained to you at your show. Some people just leave and never come back without complaining. I usually let the management know why they won't be getting my money or my friend's money in the future. It goes a little like this; My friends and I are leaving because the KJ just skipped every person in the bar by letting some guy, who just walked in 5 minutes ago, get up to sing when we've been waiting over an hour to sing again. I hope that guy comes back every week and spends enough money to make up for the two to three hundred bucks my friends and I USED TO SPEND HERE ON A WEEKLY BASIS.

Sorry to say me & Karen run almost identical regarding rotation (at least the way i've heard her describe her method), we also get lots of late comers that are just getting off & come in to party, not going to deny these regulars that come in every night week after week - again we have one group of 10 that comes in at around 11 every night & their bar tab is bigger than anyones that have have been sipping/nursing their drink all night, not that that is a consideration in my decison to get someone up or not, everyone gets a chance to sing. Our bar has the mentality that they appreciate anyone that frequents the bar - they are a customer whether they have been there for 5 hours every night or 1 hour every night because their situation prohibits them from coming in any earlier.
So I guess you would need to avoid my show as well, that's completely ok though, that just leaves a seat open for the next customer.

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In one post you say you close the rotation at 11:30 PM if you have enough singers to finish off the show. Now you're saying that you have a group of 10 heavy drinkers that aren't subjected to that "rule". So much for fairness.

Well if you would actually READ instead taking bits & pieces & putting them together to try to make a point, I said on the weekends I have had to close the rotation AS EARLY AS 11:30. On avg it's about 12:00 MIDNIGHT on any given night. Sometimes even later, sometimes earlier. If those that get there AFTER I close the rotation, they do not get to sing as they are there too late. If they get there before I cut it off, then there's a good chance they will sing. So yes, they are subjected to that rule just as much as anyone else.

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I know of a KJ that made a gag "State Karaoke License". I think I will do the same and display it. If I have a problem with "Rotation Whinning" I will just tell them I could lose my license if I let them sing before their time and show them the license.

Never underestimate the importance of running a fair rotation. At a place I used to frequent, the two hosts would each sing two songs every round, no matter how many customers were in line (that's 4 songs per round). One fellow got into a fight with one of the hosts over it and left for another venue. There he encountered a guy who's signature song was Mack The Knife. Time passed, Mack The Knife moved away and the first fellow made up with the hosts at his former venue and returned there.

A few years later, the first venue was having a band for a special night so the fellow went to the other karaoke place. There he met Mack the Knife who had also moved back and he invited him to come to his regular karaoke place the next week. Mack the Knife did, he met me there, we have been together over 6 years and now I have all sorts of debt on my credit card as we are starting our own karaoke business--all this because of a fight over rotation. Just goes to show.......what?

Leopard - great story !

As for taking slips until the end of the show, I do. In the last half an hour I let people know they may not have a chance to sing if given a slip that late in the night, but I'll take it just in case.

The reason being is everyone knows when I close up karaoke and they tend to start leaving about that time. There sometimes is a backup of people trying to close their tabs, so people try to avoid this by getting an early start on leaving. So the last half an hour can bring me down to very few singers. I take those new slips because they maybe the only people left. It just goes to show every venue is different.

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as a regular singer not a kj perspective
i am a regular that understands the rotation will get longer as the night goes on
if some one whines oh well to bad, the kj does keep slips for all of the singers who have been in more than once, this way it is not a waste of his money with printing out more slips than needed
this is a small show in a small town. usually starts with 15 singers then ends with anywhere from 30 to 40 which means patience is needed by a bunch of alcohol soaked singers. but we all seem to keep coming back isn't that the goal.
i have a lot of respect for you guys and girls because i see where it can be a challenge to give more people a turn and still keep regulars happy. as for this regular i dont think i have ever had a bad night singing

I usually do right up until the last half hour. And it's the same thing... you never know.

Since we often go right up to 2:30 people are peeling out big time that last hour. The last round is a reward for the die-hard regulars and I close it when we get down to them.

"Everyone tells me the owner is their friend, or they have to leave in 5 minutes (they never do), or all those people over there are waiting to hear me sing, or how much would it cost to bump me..."

This one cracks me up. I wonder why they think I would want to "favor" someone who is going to leave in 5 minutes versus someone who is going to stay another 2 hours and spend more money in the bar?

I tell 'em that my own mother won't get up any faster if she's leaving. Or in the area I live, I say "You could be the Pope and I wouldn't be able to get you up any faster."

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Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
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I've got a better one! Some guy who was like 15th in rotation kept coming up and standing by my spot at the end of the stage asking me if he was next and that he and his brother would "rock the house".

I continued to call names in the rotation. It was late, and some of the people I called up had already left. He stood next to me and kept shouting, "I'll go up...I'll go up!"

When that didn't work, he would hover a dollar bill over my tip jar and wave it teasingly like he WOULD put it in if he could sing next. Puh-LEESE!

When his regular rotation turn came up, him and his buddy did a horrible off-key shouting theatrical version of "Bohemian Rhapsody".

Yikes.

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Yeah. I get that one all the time. "I'll rock this place!", or "I kill this song". Not so much. Although they may "kill" the song, it will not be in a good way. My days of moving people up a bit that say they can do a song really well are over.

I'm done with the people that say that say they need to leave; been burned on that one too many times too. They will sing their song out of rotation, then turn in another slip! Are you kidding me?! What happened to your ride leaving, or your friend that is waiting for a ride in the middle of nowhere?

Ya know, if you think of it, the "I have to leave" is actually the WORST incentive to move someone up. Why would I move up a song slip in order to get someone to leave the bar quicker??? It's counter-productive! So now when they tell me they need to leave in ten minutes, I politely say,"Oh, then it looks like you are gonna miss your song. Here, why don't you take this slip with you for next time."

They almost ALWAYS say,"Let's just leave it in the rotation, just in case I'm still here". HA!

I'm never impressed with the people who think they should be put up earlier in rotation because they tell me they sing in a band, won a karaoke contest some where or I supposedly will be blown away. In fact from my experience if they have to tell me how great they are before they sing they probably are going to be horrible.

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When someone tries the old, "But I've gotta leave in 10 minutes, can't you put me up?" I'll bite once - and as soon as they're done, I follow them to their chair, thank them profusely for coming in, ask when they'll be able to make it back in, and watch their reaction. Usually they're with friends, so everyone gets to hear it. I just despise that excuse and don't succumb, but once in a while it's fun to turn it on them.