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Anyone host a show or attend a show that allows the singer to sing 2 two songs back to back? What would be the pro's and cons of hosting such a show. One of the cons would be rotation wait time would be twice as long.
But then again as a singer you get to sing 2 songs back to back and therefore capitilize on your "spotlight" time. On very slow nights I sometimes let the singers sing two in a row. I was wondering what a show would be like if all singers had the chance to sing two songs back to back. SINGERS would you like this? KJ's?

If I have a short rotation - usually 5 or under, then I will let them do 2 songs back to back, but anything over that get to be a very long wait - especially if you have a lot of singers.

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ditto dat

plus... if you get a couple howlers, that's twice as long to suffer! !

Knight
I completely understand about the howlers.

Lon,
Thats one of my questions to the singers..Would you rather get up 4 times a night for 4mins a time or 2 times a night for 8 mins ? I'm curious to see if some singers would rather get up for longer times in the spotlight.
My rotations have been running around 12-15 on a BUSY NIGHT so 2 songs at a time might not be too bad. Unless someone requests two 8 min songs....

I tend to only let them sing once. Even if the number of singers is low I only let them sing twice if I don't have another person ready to sing.

I went to a show that had a low number of people (about 6) and we were singing twice for each rotation. It was over an hour before I got up to sing because the KJ was slow. It got to be overly annoying and the people that came in later were wondering why they didn't get to sing twice.

It can be frustrating when you have more people show up and they start wondering about the twice up and when they get theirs. To avoid any conflict I prefer to do the once up... no complaints so far.

One of the contests I enter runs it that you get up and sing 2 songs at a time. I don't like this very much and would rather sing one and then sing another during the rotation.

At least for a contest you wouldn't get someone getting the advantage of walking in at 1130 and signing up to sign when the judges have had a few and think the William Hung is the next American Idol.

I've mentioned it before in another post last week -- that I am a person that likes variety so I'd rather hear one singer sing, sit down and move on to the next singer.

Yes - I agree with Matt that listening to some people sing 2 songs in a row would be much tougher than once and gettin a break before they wail another song =).

2 solo's in a row?? NOPE!

Show policy is ... everyone is allowed to put in one slip per round. Even on slow nights.... we stick to that.

One night last winter.... we had blizzard conditions... 18 below zero...snowing like crazy... and wind gusts up to 35 mph (wind chill was like -40 or something insane like that.)

We had 11 people walk into the club.... (no.. they wouldn't close....) and of those 11.... 7 were our good ole regular Karaoke singers...(sorta like that postman's motto ... ya know.. ).

Anyway.... we stuck to the one slip a rotation.... all 7 people sang something like 11 songs over the course of the 4 hrs.... and everyone stayed till the end of the show.

If we'd let them sing 2 or more.... we probably wouldn't have had anyone there for the last hour.

So ... we stick to the show policy..... and it seems to help keep the crowd... and yes, Matt... save the ears from the howlers!!

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I have done twofers in the early stages on very slow nights. If the few singers are also dueters, it can be a good opportunity to knock some of those off before others come in as well. Mostly these days, the regulars will have me pick new songs (not meaning new releases) for them to try while it's slow. Have had a lot of fun with that and it's nice to when someone really hits one and ends up adding it to their repertoire.

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Sounds Great! Entertainment
Bartlett, Illinois

No twofers here. I have gone to several shows that allow them and I hate them.

One show I visited had each singer sing 2 in a row, and then the KJ played a dance song between singers to boot! At least he was consistent all night long with it. That was a one time stop.

Then there is another KJ in my market (don't really consider him a competitor though) who will do doubles, and even three plays! He draws the line there because...(scroll down)
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Four play is for the bedroom. I am not making this up! This is also the guy who has it in writing in his songbooks, "Money talks--bullsh*t walks." He is actively and openly soliciting bribes to get bumped to the front of the line!

Just these two things alone are reasons why he may occasionally work in my area but I don't consider him my competition!

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Spreading the karaoke gospel

I have been to some shows that do "Two-Fers," but only when they hardly have any singers. I don't mind that. But, I have also been to a show, where this company's policy is "Two-fers" all night. They usually run a 4 hour show, and have been known to have a 15-20 plus Rotation. And, to add insult to injury, they work as co-hosts at their shows. The 1st host opens the show with His Two-Fer, then Host number 2 does his, then they sing a Duet together (sometimes 2 duets), so they have just hogged up 30 minutes of the show to themselves before anyone has gotten up to sing. I refuse to go to this company's shows because of that (and the Two-fer policy that they use, regardless of how crowded it is). I don't like going to a show early, and then wondering if I'm going to get up again for a 2nd turn. I would rather sing 2 songs at a show that has a 2 hour plus rotation, than to sing 2 songs early in the night, and then find out that that's all I'm going to sing.

Marty3 snip ~~~


Duets occur in our show as well... in a few instances, someone may in fact sing twice in a row..... if one is a solo (their slip) and the second song is as a duet partner (other person's slip). Again though, we stick to one slip "per singer~per round". If it so happens that someone sings twice in a round... its because they've been asked to "duet"... on another singer's slip. But again... unless its UNUSUALLY slow.... we try to be sure that those two slips aren't back-to-back ... (can't always control that, but we try).

Do you get alot of people singing duets over the course of one of your shows? We do!! Probably 3-5 duets per 25 singer round... is pretty typcal for us. How about the rest of you?

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[shadow=tomato]If you want your significant other to pay attention to EVERY word you say::
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It looks like the consenus is that 2 for shows are not liked by either KJ or Singer. I guess I got my answer... . It was "suggested: by one of my regulars and I needed to see what the experts here had to say!! Glad I aksed ! Thanks ..AGAIN

Glad to see this topic brought up again. In my area, 2fers are the rule, and what people have come to expect. It does make the evening drag a little, and when u have the bad singers.......

But as a general rule, people tend to like maximizing their time in the spotlight. There are nights when I am forced to cut to 1 song, but I still try to do the 2 for new singers, 1 for everyone else.

And thanks Shotgun.....never considered it could keep people there longer with 1 song...gotta try it one of these days.

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Let's Kick the Tires and Light the Fires!

I might need to clarify. If you only have 2-3 singers and the first person give you 4 slips and when they get done there's no one else I've been known to let them sing another if they want. But it's a case of beginning the show and it's me or them. In these cases I'll let them sing again but comment that "We a have a long rotation already, give me a slip and YOU'RE UP!".

I have to be careful with duets. We had a problem at one show I had where the rotation was about 25 deep with 4-5 people turning in a duet with the same person. I had to tell them to get another partner or it might not come up for a couple hours. They usually picked another person or dropped it completely.

Happens at our show frequently..... we have two incredibly great male singers.. and EVERYONE wants to duet with them! It HAS happened... that if "Mike" puts in HIS slip for a solo .... and then Meg, Jeanie and Angel all put in their slips as duets with Mike.... that MIKE might sing 4 times in that round. But.... show policy is... one slip per singer per round ~~~ do with it as YOU wish! so.... if MIKE (the partner) sings a lot, by request... its still "fair" ...... 'cause it was the other person's "slip". We wouldn't dream of telling someone they had to find another duet partner... or that they'd lose their turn in the rotation... because they wanted to do a duet. And ya know... we've NEVER EVER had anyone complain. They know.. that their "spot" is theirs... and they can do what they want with it... including "sharing the spot light".

I think ... alot has to do with how you introduce the singers. We always call the singer to the stage .... "Its time for us to welcome Angel to the stage" (small pause) "ANGEL has requested that MIKE duet with her.. so come on up Mike" .... thus maintaining the spotlight for "Angel".
At the end of the performance.... We thank Angel and Mike... singing from Angel's slip. As I say... it works for us... with no complaints.

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[shadow=tomato]If you want your significant other to pay attention to EVERY word you say::
  TALK IN YOUR SLEEP   [/shadow]  

The problem with the duets was that I had a packed house of about 200 people and when they see the same guy coming up to sing over and over they start to wonder why he sang 5 times and they haven't sung yet. After he sang 3 times in one round and I got someone asking why he sang that many times I started implementing this policy and had no complaints from anyone - including those requesting to sing with him.

Oh.... I hear you KM.... and I can understand why it might be a question.... but... again... telling someone HOW to use their turn... or who to sing duets with... isn't anything we'd do at OUR show. If it's working for you ... COOL.

Hugs, Cindy

Cindy--

It's not about telling anyone HOW to use their turn. It's about fairness to other singers. I'm guessing that your show is probably very small with rotations of 8-10 singers. That's the only way I could see your system working.

I have it posted very prominently in my songbooks that duets count as one turn for each person.

In Shotgun's example, If Mike puts in a song and then gets signed up to sing with four other singers, Mike ain't singing his solo song at my show. I'd also let the other singers who are signed up with Mike that they may want to turn in a solo request since Mike is signed up to sing with all these other people and he'll only get one song per rotation just like everybody else.

I only say this because my shows tend to have rotations of 20-30 people so there is a long wait between trips to the mic. If I were a customer and I saw Mike up to sing 4 times before I get my second song, I'm gonna be p*ssed off and complain.

This also avoids rotation abuse. Say Mike signs up to sing a solo. Then he has his friend Fred sign them up for a duet where Fred basically stands there and Mike sings. Then he has Mary do the same and Lisa and Joe. Mike is basically getting 5 songs per rotation.

The other thing that happens is you get 4 drunks who want to sing as a group. Under your system this group would get 4 songs per rotation, with each person using their turn to get a song for the group. Even in a 20 person rotation, that is a lot. Would you honestly want to stay at a show where the same 4 people were singing 20% of the time and you had to wait an hour and a half to get your turn? I wouldn't and neither would MY customers.

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Spreading the karaoke gospel

Seems like most of you here with the exeption of Shotgun CC are agains duets. Did I read that right?

I'm not against duets, I just handle them differently than Shotgun CC.

I let each person sing once per rotation while she opts to let each person in a duet potentially sing twice per rotation.

All in all it depends on how busy I am. At a slow show the rotations turn over so fast it doesn't matter because everyone is coming up ever 10-20 minutes or so (rotations 5-8 deep). At a crowded show with a rotation running 20-30 people or more I only allow each singer 1 shot per turn whether it's as a duet or as a solo singer. With a rotation that deep people are paying attention to how often they sing vs. everyone else and if someone else sings 2 or 3 times before they come up again they might not say anything but they likely won't be back (or they'll start putting in duets with everyone in the room).

The other this is that many of the duets are longer songs so it makes sense to count it as a song for each person. Most of the Meatloaf duets are over 5 minutes, as are many of the other duets commonly chosen (although IIRC Picture is about 4 minutes).

Group singings I sometimes don't count though - we had some softball teams come in and the team that won put in 'We are the champions'. I didn't count anyone in that singing since it was about 15-20 people.