The Songburst ’09 singing competition at the Orange County Market Place (OCMP) was a huge success! More than 200 contestants turned out for the competition in both the Junior and Adult categories…and what talent! In fact, the event was so successful that we unfortunately had to turn away contestants after the first 40 sign-ups in the Adult category due to lack of time, as the OCMP closes at 4pm. We are already making plans with the OCMP to have qualifying rounds for the adults on both Saturday and Sunday to accommodate the large number of contestants.

Congratulations to the SongBurst ’09 winners. Taking 1st place in the adult category was Jessica Salinas winning $1,000 and taking 1st place in the junior category was Summer Cummings winning a $1,000 savings bond. In 2nd place for the adults was Smitty ($500), 3rd place Deirdre Harp ($300), 4th place Mr. Lee ($200) and 5th place Mothership ($100). For the juniors, taking second 2nd place was Madison McNamee ($500 savings bond) and 3rd place Kenneth Veal ($200 savings bond). All of the contestants were terrific and each and every contestant was truly a winner.

We would like to thank the Orange County Market Place for all they did to make this such a special event. They are a class organization and a pleasure to work with. Special thanks to Jill Lloyd of the OCMP who helped make everything run so smoothly and personally looked after the contestants to make sure everyone had a great time. The Karaoke community is fortunate to have a fine organization like the Orange County Market Place to support important events such as this.

Sincere thanks also go to Tony DeFazio of Starlight Entertainment for hosting the Junior Competition and providing the sound for the entire event. And kudos go to radio and television personality (and popular KJ), Manny Pacheco, for his outstanding hosting of the Adult Competition.

KaraokeFest 2009 is coming on Saturday, September 5th at the fabulous L.A. County Fair in Pomona. By popular demand, KaraokeFest will again be held on a Saturday so we can all, once again, celebrate during our day-long Karaoke party on Saturday and then have a whole day to relax and recharge our batteries on Sunday. And remember, the “Fair” is open longer on Saturday; the hours are 10am – midnight. All of the exciting details for KaraokeFest 2009 will be available at www.KaraokeScene.com and in our June/July issue.

As KaraokeFest 2009 approaches, we are nearing the time for the “Oscars” of Karaoke, the “Karaoke Golden Achievement Awards.” These awards are so important because they provide a way to honor those in the Karaoke community whose special contributions deserve to be recognized. These awards are actually rewards for those people and venues that rise above the norm and make a significant, positive difference to Southern California Karaoke. Whether it is being an outstanding KJ, having the fairest rotation, offering great sound, food, service or a fabulous stage from which to sing, the “extras” provided by the nominees in their prospective categories make all of our Karaoke singing experiences so much better.

Please take the time to cast your vote for the people and/or venues you think are worthy to be recognized for their efforts. And bear in mind that the more votes that are cast, the more representative the results. You may vote online at www.KaraokeScene.com. The voting begins on May 15th and lasts until June 30th. In the interest of fairness, only one vote per email address and two votes per IP address will be accepted. Again, the “Karaoke Golden Achievement Awards” depend on YOU, the Karaoke community, to participate and let those who are worthy know that you appreciate their efforts. They are there for you; you should be there for them!

Soon after the “Karaoke Golden Achievement Award” voting ends, the mother of all singing contests will begin. On July 5th, the prestigious “Crème de la Crème” singing competition will “kick off” with singers from all over Southern California (and beyond) competing for thousands in cash and prizes and the coveted title of “Male & Female Karaoke Vocalist of the Year” plus all that goes with it. Don’t miss your chance to compete and become a singing star! All of the details will be available at www.KaraokeScene.com and in our June/July issue.

We are currently in the process of selecting the venues for our 3 KaraokeFest 2009 competitions. If you would like your venue to be considered, please contact Karaoke Scene at the number or email address listed below.

KaraokeFest 2009 Expo also offers a golden opportunity for Karaoke related businesses to exhibit and sell their products. The “Expo” area will be located adjacent to where our main show will be held and totally accessible to the tens of thousands in attendance. There will be an estimated 100,000+ people at the L.A. County Fair that day so exhibitors are sure to receive maximum exposure.

Major sponsorship positions for KaraokeFest 2009 are also available to qualified companies.

For major sponsorship information, contest venue information or to reserve your “Expo” booth, please call (714) 826-2212 or email us at info@KaraokeScene.com. Space and time are limited so be sure to contact us now!

Karaoke Scene would like to welcome 2 new venues to our happy family of advertisers, Route 66 Roadhouse & Tavern in Duarte with Karaoke hosted by Lamont Johnson & Sunshine of LNJ Productions, and Silver Dollar in Chula Vista with Karaoke hosted by Mike Keough of T&B Productions. These are places well worth visiting to have a great Karaoke experience!

 It’s SongBurst time! Karaoke Scene is very pleased to again be presenting this year’s SongBurst singing competition at the Orange County Market Place, “America’s greatest outdoor shopping festival.”

The excitement begins on Saturday, February 14th and continues every Saturday for 4 weeks (February 21st, February 28th and March 7th.) Rain out dates will be the corresponding Sundays. There will be both an adult and a junior competition. Juniors (17 years of age and under) will compete first and then the adults (18 years of age and older) will follow shortly after. Sign-ups for juniors are from 9am to 10:30am with the adult sign-ups from 11am to 12:30pm. The competition will begin for juniors at 11am with the adult competition starting at approximately 1pm. There will be over $3,000 in cash and savings bonds awarded at the finals which will be held on Saturday, March 21st (that’s 2 weeks after the last qualifying round). Lots of prize money and lots of excitement. Rain out date for the finals will be March 22nd.

For those of you who may not know, the Orange County Market Place is a fantastic outdoor maze of nearly a thousand vendors selling products of all kinds. It also includes a wide variety of places to eat and drink featuring a wide variety of foods from hot dogs to churros to fresh produce to gourmet foods to fresh squeezed lemonade to ice cold beer. Take your pick.

These competition weekends will be great fun for everybody, both singers and their friends and families. The Orange County Market Place is very “family friendly” and there is truly something for everyone there. So pack everybody up and come on down to spend the day. You’ll have a terrific time! Please see pages 14 & 15 or visit KaraokeScene.com for more SongBurst details.

Directions: The Orange County Market Place is located at the Costa Mesa Fairgrounds, 88 Fair Drive, Costa Mesa. Exit at the Del Mar/Fair Dr. off ramp on the Newport (55) Freeway South. The Fairgrounds will be on the right.

Congratulations to Christel Santo at Arbor’s Steak and Seafood in Huntington Beach for their very successful toy drive in support of the U.S. Marines Toys for Tots at her Karaoke show December 16th. This event was made all the more special by three-time KJ of the Year, Donna Thomas (no stranger to fundraisers herself), who put together a bus load of her regulars from the TomKat Lounge in Buena Park to come down and support the event. All of Christel’s Karaoke family of friends turned out and brought toys galore. Christmas carols were the main Karaoke fare for the evening and everyone had a great time. The event was a huge success and Christel would like to express her thanks and appreciation to everyone who helped make it possible. Kudos to Christel Santo and Donna Thomas for their selfless efforts to help these needy children.

Karaoke at the airport? You got it. This past holiday season, Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston offered Karaoke to its waiting passengers, and with apparent great success. This is very good “outside the box” thinking and a sensational idea to allay passengers anxiety and frustration while waiting for their flights. According to news reports everyone loved it. We think this an idea that should catch on at airports across the country. Who knows? Maybe Karaoke at airports will some day be as common as over-priced refreshment stands and lost luggage. A big tip of the Karaoke hat goes to Bush Intercontinental Airport for a terrific idea!

Thanks so much to the Karaoke community for the photos you sent to us for publication. We sincerely appreciate your efforts. Please continue to send us your pics so we can publish them in future issues. Attention KJs…it’s a great public relations idea to take photos of your customers while they are singing at your shows and send them to us. Karaoke folks love to see their pictures in the magazine. When sending photos please remember:

Be sure your photos are in a digital format (jpeg files); no prints.
Your photos should be about singing.
Please make sure your photos are as sharp and clear as possible.

Please send your photos by email to photos@KaraokeScene.com or you may put them on a CD and mail them to:

Karaoke Scene
PO Box 2633
Cypress, CA 90630

We are still looking for the “right” depiction of what “Karaoke Super Guy” might look like based on his description in the first and second installment. He is not described in intimate detail, but only generally, so you have some latitude in your efforts. The submissions, so far, have not quite hit the mark in the opinions of our staff and the writers. So, we have decided to sweeten the pot a little for the person who submits the best illustration of “Karaoke Super Guy” and his ordinary human counterpart, “Quincy Beanfang.” $100 will now be awarded to the person whose drawings/sketches are chosen to represent our new Karaoke super hero. In order to once again refresh everyone’s memory, here is the portion of the first episode that describes him, both as a super hero and as an ordinary human.

Suddenly Quincy experienced a searing pain in his throat and his scalp felt like it was on fire. He turned to the mirror and couldn’t believe what he saw. Looking back at him was a stranger unlike anyone he had ever seen before. He was completely bald (with a weird criss-cross type pattern on his scalp, almost like the head of a microphone), muscular with handsome chiseled features and was adorned with a kind of suit which looked like it had been made from parts of his living room.

It was a typical evening for Karaoke singer, Quincy Beanfang, a 25 year old male nurse of slight build and quite ordinary looks.

Please be sure to submit a drawing of both entities, “Karaoke Super Guy” and “Quincy Beanfang.”

Please send your submissions for “Karaoke Super Guy” by email to info@KaraokeScene.com or you may mail them to:

Karaoke Scene
PO Box 2633
Cypress, CA 90630

Sorry, we cannot return the submissions.

Be sure to check out the article about our KaraokeFest 2009 Male and Female Vocalists of the Year and their trip to Utah for their own personal recording sessions, courtesy of Priddis Music and ProSound (pages 16 & 17). They had a ball. Thanks again also to VocoPro and Ace Karaoke for their sponsorship of KaraokeFest. We sincerely appreciate the support and generosity of fine companies like these in helping us present these major Karaoke events.

See you at Songburst…and best of luck to all!

 It’s nearing year’s end…and this has certainly been quite a year! The Karaoke industry is moving in new directions and Karaoke, as an entertainment medium, continues to flourish. Karaoke remains the number one form of live entertainment in Southern California with hundreds of venues from Ventura County to the Mexican border. And Karaoke Scene Magazine is delivered to all of them to be enjoyed by everyone.

The “Singer’s Showcase” right here on our extremely popular website, continues to be an overwhelming favorite with singers all around the world. This thing is really a blast! If you haven’t checked it out yet, you should because you have been missing a great time.

And for all you KJs out there, our “KJ Directory” at www.KaraokeScene.com is the perfect way to make sure the whole Karaoke world knows about you and your shows. Sign up now!

Our “Adventures of Karaoke Super Guy” series continues to evoke great response from our readers. Brigitte Wolf and Panos Papathopoulos have really put together something special here. We hope you all will continue to enjoy this light hearted, tongue in cheek Karaoke oriented super-hero fantasy.

And speaking of “Karaoke Super Guy,” when we first published the series we wondered what he might look like from the somewhat oblique description of him in the first installment. So, we decided to offer a prize to the person who submitted the best illustration of “Karaoke Super Guy” and his ordinary human counterpart, “Quincy Beanfang,” as chosen by our staff. We offered a $50 prize to the person whose drawings were chosen to represent our new Karaoke super hero. Although we had a number of submissions, unfortunately, in the opinion of our staff (and the writers), none of them quite hit the mark so we let it go for a while.

Well, we want to try it again. The writers are anxious to put a physical face and personality to the character and have asked us to please re-run the contest. It has been a while since the physical description of “Karaoke Super Guy” has appeared in print so, to refresh everyone’s memory, here is the portion of the first episode that describes him, both as a super hero and as an ordinary human.

Suddenly Quincy experienced a searing pain in his throat and his scalp felt like it was on fire. He turned to the mirror and couldn’t believe what he saw. Looking back at him was a stranger unlike anyone he had ever seen before. He was completely bald (with a weird criss-cross type pattern on his scalp, almost like the head of a microphone), muscular with handsome chiseled features and was adorned with a kind of suit which looked like it had been made from parts of his living room.

It was a typical evening for Karaoke singer, Quincy Beanfang, a 25 year old male nurse of slight build and quite ordinary looks.

Please be sure to submit a drawing of both entities, “Karaoke Super Guy” and “Quincy Beanfang.”

Please send your submissions for “Karaoke Super Guy” by email to info@KaraokeScene.com or you may mail them to:

Karaoke Scene
PO Box 2633
Cypress, CA 90630

Sorry, we cannot return the submissions.

Good luck to all of you!

Don’t forget, you can see your own photos in Karaoke Scene Magazine. We are still accepting photos from all over the world Karaoke community for publication in future issues. We appreciate all the folks who have sent us their photos and hope to hear from more of you in the future. Here are just a few suggestions:

Your photos should be about singing.
Please make sure your photos are sharp and clear.
Please be sure your photos are in a digital format (jpeg files); no prints.

Please send your photos by email to photos@KaraokeScene.com or, if you have a lot of them, you may put them on a CD and mail them to:

Karaoke Scene
PO Box 2633
Cypress, CA 90630

We look forward to receiving them.

Our staff is very busy working on the upcoming SongBurst ‘09 Singing Competition, the winter’s biggest singing contest, which will begin on February 14 (Valentine’s Day), 2009 at the Orange County Market Place. SongBurst will again offer both an adult (18 and older) and junior (17 and younger) contest. There will be thousands in cash and prizes as well as a terrific time for all, individuals and families alike. You can check out all the details at www.KaraokeScene.com and, of course, in our next issue.

Congratulations!!! Three time KJ of the Year winner for Orange County, CA, Donna Thomas raised a phenomenal $18,079 for the Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles during her annual gala fundraiser at the TomKat Lounge in Buena Park. Karaoke Scene salutes Donna Thomas and all of the many folks who unselfishly gave so much of their time and money to help these children who need it so much.