Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Karaoke Keeps Going Strong, including a Contest at Village Lanes

Some people are no fans of karaoke.

I've met my share in the decades covering live music around Central New York, from the musicians in the bands that work hard to get gigs and produce worthy playlists to the fans who go out to appreciate those evenings. That's a delicate equilibrium, after all, what with the club owners having to decide who to hire and how much to pay them and whether or not to charge at the door and how many people must come, and how many drinks or food must they buy to cover the cost of the musicians.

There's some resentment that with karaoke an owner can hire one person with a sound system, video monitor and microphones to wheel 'em in, set 'em up and bust it out. A DJ with a different hook. Crowd participation with singing instead of dancing. Staring from all around encouraged. And the quality ..

Some people are big fans of karaoke, still and nevertheless.

Do a little Googling and somebody somewhere decided to start the wiki history with the NBC 1960s show "Sing Along with Mitch." I confess. I am old enough, barely, to have followed the bouncing ball on the bottom of the screen with Mitch Miller and his gang of merry singers. You, though, can find it on YouTube. Further down, the listing says one claim for the invention of the karaoke machine goes back to Kobe, Japan, in 1971.

In Syracuse, plenty of places still host karaoke nights. You can find them on Google, too, including one joint in Solvay, Singers Karaoke Club on Milton Ave., that ... well, look at the name of the establishment.

Two weeks ago, Jimmy Mitchell sent me a message asking me if I'd sit as one of the judges at his karaoke night at Village Lanes in East Syracuse. That's the former Astro Lanes and Bella Luna that sits in the village just off the turn that goes over the bridge. After some schedule checking, we agreed on this past Saturday night, which is not exactly Mitchell's baby, but was certainly good enough for everybody involved.

Let me tell you that karaoke lives at Village Lanes in East Syracuse starting at 8 p.m. on Fridays, hosted by Mitchell, and 9 p.m. on Saturdays, hosted by Dale Hodge Jr.

"We're making song choice critical," says Mitchell of why he believes it's taken root in the room off to the side of the bowling lanes. "We're encouraging more pumped up rock and upbeat tunes in general. We're not worried about people's vocal ranges. Just sing it well. I use my friend Jamie Cosco of Ruby Shooz as an example. He was probably the most popular front man in the state, and he just sang the songs."

Mitchell is a good guy to talk about karaoke and singing in general.

He's hosted karaoke nights in several clubs, yes, before starting this run at Village Lanes in 2012. He became a fan of karaoke, he says, at the Sing Along Saloon in East Syracuse in 1989. And he started the Syracuse vocal group Street Corner "after singing in the men's room at a Cindy Ormond Karaoke show."

Over the years, he says, he'd fill vacancies that opened in Street Corner by putting the word out in the karaoke circles.

He's retired the singing group but calls his karaoke company Street Corner Entertainment.

Advancing in the contest Saturday night were, left to right, Missy Reese, Stephanie Crippen, Sara Von Zwehl and Nicki Rapp.

I walked into the middle of a contest Saturday night, a series pitting Mitchell's Street Corner vs. Hodge's Maximum Power. Nine singers were performing for the final four spots on Hodge's squad. Mitchell's eight-singer team had been finalized Friday night.

The eight vs. eight rounds will be held May 15 and 16, with the overall winner taking home $100 and a lot of bragging rights. Other prizes also will be awarded.

The nine sang, their friends cheered and clapped, Mitchell, I and third judge Mandy -- who volunteered out of the crowd and promised no biases -- each ranked them one through nine considering voice, performance and crowd reaction. 

After Mitchell tallied the points, the four singers who advanced to Hodge's team were Missy Reese, for her performance of Gretchen Wilson's song "I'm Here for the Party," Stephanie Crippen, for Carrie Underwood's "Last Name," Sara Von Zwehl, for Kim Carnes' "Bette Davis Eyes," and Nicki Rapp, for Miranda Lambert's "Mama's Broken Heart."

Then more folks were ready to sing more songs. Karaoke lives.
 

Mark Bialczak has lived in Central New York for 30 years. He's well known for writing about music and entertainment. In 2013, he started his own blog, markbialczak.com, to comment about the many and various things that cross his mind daily.