Karaoke Forums

Please refrain from explaining why karaoke contests suck in this thread. I have to pull one together at the behest of my venue owner so I have to make the best of it.

The owner at my 5 night a week gig has been suggesting we run a regular karaoke contest. He wants to make it a regular contest that runs for about 8 weeks of qualifiers and then run the finals. This is not set in stone though. He has asked me to start checking into what kind of contest to run and how to run it with a goal of starting up in a few weeks.

I am looking for POSITIVE suggestions on how to run the contest. Length of qualifiers, scoring system, prizes, male and female winners, etc….the whole shebang.

Thanks in advance for your POSITIVE suggestions!

-Chris

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-Chris

Running the contest on a night and/or time already scheduled for karaoke will be a big mistake, in my experience. Pick a night or time that won't disrupt regulars from attending your current shows.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

so don't do a kamakazi contest..... people just get pissed off and don't come back.

if you do a contest, let if be volintary and run it with your regular singing in your normal rotation. and the contestants sing their contest song in their normal rotation.

anounce when a contest singer is singing so people pay attention (or your judges) .

select judges that are not singing and not sitting at a group table, if you can find someone sitting at the bar drinking alone and not singing is the best. and buy him or her a drink for judging....

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It's all good!

Ahh, the pros & cons of hosting karaoke contest. Chris - you can pick up some “positives” from last year’s discussion of Karaoke Contest May 2011. Wishing you the best of luck!
viewtopic.php?f=1&t=21517

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To be fortunate enough to derive an income from a source as fulfilling as karaoke music has got to be as close to heaven as we can get here on earth!

Why do you say that. We used to run one for nearly 5 years straight every Sun. People used to come in specifically for it. Thinking about bringing it back. We had to stop a couple years ago because of new tribal rules in giving money away for prizes or something like that - we figure on giving a gas card for the same amount or maybe a Visa gift card for the prize.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Whenever we ran a long contest we'd usually have 8-10 weeks of qualifying. We would take the first & second place winners for the finals - giving 16-20 finalists, you can adjust to get more or less if needed. One song for qualifying. They would need to sing 2 songs for the finals, one fast one slow. Not back to back, we'd draw names for the first line up. After everyone sang their first song, we gave a 15 minute break, then repeated the lineup for the 2nd round. Cannot sing the same song you qualified with for the finals.
We would usually charge a $5 entry fee for contestants - which would be applied toward final prize money as well. This also gives a little more seriousness to the contest over someone entering just to sing another song.
Judging - NEVER use audience response for a judging criteria, it's never fair unless your goal is to make the winner the one that brought in the most people only. If your goal is to run a fair contest, then this is not the way to go. Judge on vocal ability and stage presence and/or appearance. We would encourage finalists to dress up for the finals - this makes for a nicer looking finals contest instead of people singing in ripped jeans & t-shirts & this was part of the appearance scores.
I would make the finals for an afternoon, since it will be more of it's own entity, you don't want to take up a full night of karaoke just for a finals, plus it gives the bar some extra revenue for the day that they most likely would not have received before. COntests on regular karaoke nights for the qualifyers isn't a bad thing, usually no more than 1 hour out of the night, but do it all at once.
Judges should be of people preferably not with people in the bar, if you can get outside judges for the qualifyers, that would be best. At least 3 judges.
For the finals, we always tried to step the judging up - local 'karaoke friendly' musicians, local radio personalities, vocal instructors, local recording studio workers - just people in general with SOME kind of music related background. Always tried to get at least 5 judges for a finals. Give them a dinner and maybe a couple drinks on the house.
That's all I can think of right off hand, i'm sure there is more though.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

Here are the rules we used for last year's annual contest. We make minor adjustments each year, but these are the basics of what we've been doing for the past six years. Our contest is held on Friday nights... which are not our regular karaoke nights.

Wallaceburg Canadian Belgian Dutch Club
Homeward Star Search 2011
Contest Rules

1. Contestant shall be nineteen years of age or older as of November 18, 2011.

2. The Grand Prize (First Place) winner in any year shall be ineligible to compete in the following year. He/she must “sit out” for one year.

3. Contest will be held on eight consecutive Friday evenings, beginning September 30, 2011 and ending on November 18, 2011 at the CBD Club, 1342 Dufferin Avenue, Wallaceburg, Ontario.

4. Contestants must be in attendance not later than 7:30 pm to register and be included in that evening’s competition.

5. Registration is limited to a maximum, of twenty contestants per evening, and will be considered on an in-person, first-come, first-served basis. The completion of a registration form does not guarantee that a registrant will be selected to compete.

6. Contestants shall sing “Karaoke-style”, without additional assistance of persons or musical instruments.

7. Order-of-performance will be determined by lottery-type draw for each performance.

8. Contestants may select from the list of Karaoke songs which will be made available at the CBD Club, or provide his/her own clearly labeled CD+G Karaoke disc.

9. Contestants will be required to sing one song during preliminary rounds, and two songs in each of the semi-final and final rounds.

10. Contestants shall not repeat a song choice in any stage of the competition.

11. Contestants will be allowed one re-start (for key change etc). Subsequent re-starts will result in deducted points.

12. Contestants will be adjudicated by a panel of judges who will consider Singing/Vocal Ability (70%), Stage Presence (20%), and Song Choice (10%).

13. Contestants must not question or argue scores with judges. Judges may, at their discretion, make comments on individual score sheets. Score sheets will be made available to contestants at the end of each evening.

14. Four winners will be chosen in each of weeks one through five. These twenty preliminary winners will advance to one of two semi-final competitions (10 to each, via random draw) to be held in weeks six and seven.

15. Any contestant, who fails to place in the top four in any preliminary round, may re-enter the contest in any or all subsequent weeks two through five.

16. By registering as a contestant, registrants agree to allow publication of photographs, videos, and/or music clips in print and/or electronic media as deemed desirable by the CBD Club’s Contest Committee.

17. The CBD Club reserves the right to shorten, or extend the contest without notice if deemed necessary.

18. The Chairperson of the CBD Club Executive Committee (Club President), or her designate, shall be the final authority in any and all disputes, which may arise in respect to the Contest.

19. Failure to comply with Contest Rules, as set out herein, may result in disqualification.


For those who might be interested, I can also provide you with Judges Sheets, Entry Forms, and Song Selection sheets... even the spread sheet that we use in tabulating the scores.

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Earl
(BS, PHD & Certified CurmuDJeon)

[font=Times New Roman]"Growing Old may be mandatory... but growing UP is still optional."[/font]

The difference is that you run several nights per week in the same location, so folks can choose which night to come.

You stated that people came specifically for that night, because they had the option to CHOOSE to do so, or come to that venue on one of the other nights. Of course those who CHOSE that night will like it.

However, in a venue that runs karaoke ONE night per week, the option to choose isn't there. People who just come to sing without being in a contest WILL get tinkled off, and look for another venue for that night.

Now, as requested by the OP, I will refrain from any further negatives and note the following:

Judging is always the biggest issue. If someone just hangs out there on karaoke night, chances are they will know at least some of the singers, or at least that will be the perception. I strongly suggest bringing in complete strangers, and hopefully folks who don't normally participate in karaoke. Maybe friends from outside the business, or reps from local businesses that don't mind a little extra exposure. You could even enlist their sponsoship to beef up the prizes or advertising.

To evenout the field, I would suggest 3 catagories for judging:

Vocal ability, Stage Presence/Entertainment value, and audience response.

This way, the singer who brought the most people to clap for them doesn't automatically win.

The super-trained semi-pro singer may not be as entertaining as several less talented singers, but merely stand there, also not an automatic win.

Of course the best stage presence may also have the worst voice...

This way everyone has a more fair chance.

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"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

If they KNOW there is a contest going in, it shouldn't matter - same applies - they can CHOOSE to come in or not knowing there is a contest. If they then choose to come in, they have no reason to (@$%&#!) that a contest is going to be happening that night because they could have chosen NOT to come or stay once they found out.

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LIKE Lonman on Facebook - Lonman Productions Karaoke & my main site via my profile!

The only reason I am not bothering to push back on having contest is because this is a new gig. We do not have an established clientele yet and Sunday's are absolutely the slowest day for this bar all day. I figure we can give it a go and let the results speak for themselves. I may not be a fan of contests, but if the bar makes money and I also see benefits then contests can stay.

-Chris

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-Chris

I think it's a reasonable approach when you don't have a going gig. Particularly if you use it to promote other nights.

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[color=#ffff55]Mickey J.[/color]
Alas for those who never sing, but die with all their music in them.
-- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Since you don't want to be told how badly they suck , I have a couple positive suggestions.

• Under no circumstances put yourself in a situation where you are picking or judging. Remain Switzerland.
• Find three, independent judges not associated with you, the bar, or any of the contestants. Let them judge.
• Never judge by "crowd applause".
• Write & distribute "Official Rules". Be sure to define the judging criteria to avoid later issues.
• Drink Heavily.

Good Luck!

I just said all of that. If they CHOOSE to come in for the contest, they will enjoy it. If they choose NOT to come in, they will go look for another venue.

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"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

If you do get five judges, another thing lots of contests do is when you tally up each score sheet, toss out the highest score and the lowest score each contestant received and then average out the middle 3 score sheets.

That gets rid of any biased judges giving any one contestant a really high or really low score. (state fiddle contests are always ran this way, and it works out!)

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♥ Laugh your heart out, dance in the rain. Cherish the memories, ignore the pain. Love and learn, forget and forgive. Because you only have one life to live. ♥

Maybe you could talk them into doing a nightly drawing instead of a contest -- every time they sing, their name goes into a pitcher, and at the end of the night, the winner (must be present to win) wins a gift card or such.

That way, everyone has a chance to win, people will stay to see if they won, and it's not a talent-based contest.

I've done these drawings before. They've been done with items as large as hotel rooms and as small as pizzas.

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Birdofsong

I was thinking along these exact lines as a compromise to running an actual contest. I was thinking about contacting local businesses to see if they had stuff to offer up for drawings.

Thanks, birdofsong!

-Chris

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-Chris

This is exactly the way to go. Everyone will know it's fair because it's all down to random chance.
You can build up a decent clientele with it and no one goes home pissed off because they didn't win.

I don't think you're going to get local businesses to chip in -- they generally only do that for charities. I can't imagine why they would give you free stuff to help the bar (unless they thought for some reason it would be good advertising). Since this is a bar that is trying to build more business, and they were going to have you do a contest anyway where they came up with a prize, I would think they could afford to purchase the drawing prizes. Even if they had 10 extra people in the bar stay for the drawings, it would more than cover the cost of a $25 gift card, bar T-Shirt or dinner at the bar.

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Birdofsong

I don't think you're going to get local businesses to chip in -- they generally only do that for charities. I can't imagine why they would give you free stuff to help the bar (unless they thought for some reason it would be good advertising). Since this is a bar that is trying to build more business, and they were going to have you do a contest anyway where they came up with a prize, I would think they could afford to purchase the drawing prizes. Even if they had 10 extra people in the bar stay for the drawings, it would more than cover the cost of a $25 gift card, bar T-Shirt or dinner at the bar.

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Birdofsong

Had I any positive experiences from karaoke contests I would share them.

Instead I'll offer a few caveats;

1. Don't have a karaoke contest. 1 person leaves happy, 30 people leave thinking you screwed them.

2. Find 3 judges who will take it relatively serious. My regular Sunday contest employed 3 judges whose "payment" was free drinks for the night. Needless to say, by midnight they were all a sloppy mess, with 1 or 2 of them leaving before the end, throwing the whole thing into disarray and making for a very negative experience.

3. Never, never, ever have a hand in picking the winners. Those that don't win will hate you forever.

4. Practice diplomacy. We all of us have those 3-4 singers who are absolutely terrible yet believe themselves the next Celine Dion or Josh Groban. Be prepared with several variations of "It must have been your song choice" and/ or "I guess they wanted a less experienced and/ or polished singer to win."

5. If you run a 4-hour show, use hour 3 for the contest. Tell them winners will be announced at the end of hour 4.

6. Remind your contestants that it's all subjective and to just have fun with it. Assuming those that don't win Week 1 can try again Weeks 2-10, chances are they'll eventually qualify for the finals.

7. Don't have a karaoke contest.

But I can see how it might be a draw for a slower night so I wish you well.

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Terry O'ke--- Fake Music for Real People.