Posted on June 11, 2012 at 5:12 pm
It’s time once again for the JRB Summer Karaoke Competition! Ladies and gentlemen, start your engines!
I did this once before, back in 2008, and to my shock and amazement, I got over 200 entries from all around the world. There were four winners in that contest, all outstanding singers, and they came to New York City to sing with me at Birdland on October 13, 2008. I’ve kept in touch with all of those winners (and several other contestants as well) and it’s been a real thrill for me to see how their lives, careers and voices have progressed in these past four years. (Check ’em out! Natalie Weiss and Jonathan Reid Gealt and Natalie Hawkins and Jonathan Shew!)
And now, to celebrate my having reached 20,000 followers on Twitter, it’s time to do it again!
There are FIVE STEPS to entering this year’s competition:
STEP ONE: Go to SoundCloud.com and sign up for an account, if you don’t already have one. All of this year’s entries have to be on SoundCloud to be eligible. A starter account (which is all you’ll need for this) is totally free. Once you’re all set up, go to GROUPS, search for “JRB Karaoke” and join that group! (SoundCloud is a really cool platform and I suspect you’ll enjoy playing around with it.)
STEP TWO: Choose and download the accompaniment track of your choice from the new Jason Robert Brown Plays Jason Robert Brown collection. You have to use one of those accompaniments to be eligible! You can download the individual tracks from iTunes (here’s the link for the men’s edition and the women’s edition), Amazon (here’s the men’s edition and here’s the women’s edition) or of course you can just use the CD that’s included when you purchase the book. If the song you want isn’t in your key, pick a different song; you’ve got 22 to choose from!
STEP THREE: Record your amazing vocal with the accompaniment track you chose. You should try to make it sound as good as you can, but don’t freak out if you don’t have fancy microphones or state-of-the-art music editing software – you should be able to do it with your phone if that’s all you’ve got. (Obviously, if the sound is too distorted or the vocal isn’t audible, you should keep trying until you get a recording that you feel lets your voice be heard.)
STEP FOUR: Upload your track to SoundCloud, and SHARE IT with the JRB Karaoke group! And you MUST tag your track with JRBKARAOKE or I won’t be able to find it or catalogue it!
and finally:
STEP THE LAST: Tweet a message to me with the following information in exactly this order:
@MrJasonRBrown
Your name
Your current state, province or (if outside the US) country
The name of the song you chose (You can abbreviate as necessary)
The link to your song (You may have to shrink this URL)
#jrbkaraoke
So a sample tweet might look like this:
@mrjasonrbrown Julia Murney, NY Stars and the Moon http://soundcloud.com/jasonrbrown/stars-and-the-moon-julia #jrbkaraoke
And that’s all you have to do!
ALL ENTRIES MUST BE SUBMITTED BY JULY 1, 2012! (And please, only one submission per person. Do one thing and do it well.)
After we’ve received your tweet, I and a panel of highly-qualified judges will listen to your entries, and we will choose the winner or winners, and we may ask for your help along the way in choosing the best folks.
What will the winner or winners receive? The winner(s) will be invited to come sing with me at a concert either in New York, London, Los Angeles or their own hometown! And while I can’t guarantee it, it’s very possible that the winner will sing a song on my new album, due this fall!
I’ve tried not to make this announcement too long because I want you all to get started singing. There will be lots of questions, I’m sure, and we’ll figure it out as we go along; leave any questions or thoughts in the comments section below. I’m so excited to hear what you all come up with! Have at it, fantastic singers! And remember to tag your tracks with JRBKARAOKE and tweet me when you’re all ready!
8 comments
Jason,
Would you also like us to “share” the uploaded track with the JRB Karaoke group on soundcloud? (This is, apparently, a thing one can do.)
[FROM JRB: Shane, that would be great. I’ve amended the instructions above to include that! Thanks!]
Can we use the “JRB Plays JRB” accompaniment tracks with the ASD application to adjust song keys?
[FROM JRB: Hey Hector. You know, I don’t know – I’ve never heard what those things sound like. Do they keep the same tempo? I’m probably not opposed in theory. How about this: just post about 30 seconds or so of one of the songs with the key changed, and I’ll listen and let you know if it’s okay to do the whole thing. Deal?]
Does it need to be in the same key as the karaoke track on itunes or is it acceptable to raise or lower the key for the recording? Thank you! SO excited! =)
[FROM JRB: Hey Erin! See my note to Hector just above. Let’s see what I think about the key-changing software. You certainly need to use the accompaniments I recorded, but if the key-changing software sounds good enough, I might be open to letting you use that.]
Do you have to be a certain age to enter?
[FROM JRB: Hi, Ella! You can enter at any age, though I don’t imagine many 5-year-olds will be submitting anything. But I’m cool with teenagers, I’m cool with grandpas, I’m cool with dogs with perfect pitch, bring it on!]
According to the software, transposing the accompaniment does not alter it’s tempo and, proven, playback time remains the same. It does seem to cause a slight distortion in the audio, where the more drastic the key change the more drastic the distortion, though just transposing it 1 or 3 semitones doesn’t seem to affect it as much.
http://soundcloud.com/hector-flores-komatsu/jrb-karaoke-key-change
In my case, I don’t NEED to transpose it to be able to sing it, haha it’s just a more comfortable key.
{FROM JRB: Look, you’re the guinea pig, give it a shot!}
Jason, so glad to see this contest again. As in 2008, I’ll be listening to all entries and making prize-free awards on theBestArts to performances that strike me as special in some way.
Break legs, everyone!
http://www.thebestarts.com/jasonrobertbrown/contest2012/
Jason,
I’m really excited about entering the competition! I am a minister by trade, and as such, I don’t swear. I know it’s a small thing, but if I was going to sing ‘Movin’ Too Fast’ there’s line in the song about doing things half-a&$%#. Would it change the meaning of the song too much if I changed that word/line? Would it be better for me to just pick a different song? I don’t mean to be picky, but I also don’t want to change your music if it bothers you. Thanks!
[FROM JRB:Well, this is a weird one. To be clear, the etymology of “half-assed” isn’t remotely established; there’s really no reason to believe that it’s even scatological, much less profane in some way. So I’m not sure why you wouldn’t feel comfortable saying it. (I would not, however, suggest you sing the lyrics of The Book of Mormon from the pulpit.) But this isn’t a competition about one word, so I don’t care if you change it. But don’t you think it would sound kind of, I don’t know… half-assed?]
Jason,
I’ve been wondering for quite some time if the JRB Singing Competition is still on?
Or did you blow it off?! (Which would be quite disappointing for most of us)
Maybe you could do some sort of update on the competition – hence it’s been a month delay.
[FROM JRB: I didn’t blow it off, I swear! Between 13 in London and this current set of shows in NY, I’ve been up to my eyeballs for two months! I’ll get right back to it next week! Hang in there!]
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