The Oxford English Dictionary now recognizes the word karaoke. Its definition
of karaoke is:
"A form of entertainment, originating in Japan, in which a person sings the vocal
line of a popular song to the accompaniment of a pre-recorded backing tape, and
the voice is electronically amplified through the loud speaker system for the
audience; also, the audio (and video) equipment used for this. Freq. Attrib.,
esp. as karaoke bar, music."
Karaoke is a Japanese word that is formed from two other words.
Kara, which means "empty". The
other word is oke, and is a shorter version for the word okesutura, or
The history of karaoke tells us that it was formed in a snack bar located in
Kobe City, Japan. The common belief on how karaoke started goes something
like this... A strolling guitarist in a snack bar in Kobe City became sick and
could not put on his show at the bar that night. The proprietor of the
snack bar came up with a solution of playing popular songs that had the singer's
voice removed. The people in the bar began singing along with
the music and having a good time. This led the owner to have these
"karaoke nights" more often as they grew in popularity.
Prior to the arrival of karaoke in Japan, people would listen and sing along
with popular songs while they were out socializing. They would also sing
along with songs being played on the radio and would often call the radio
station requesting their favorite song. Many of the bars would turn the
radio up so the patrons could sing along with it.
It is said that the Japanese people truly feel more natural singing
themselves rather than listening to others sing. This all changed with the
appearance of karaoke. Something about holding a microphone and singing along with background music
made these karaoke singers feel like they were professionals. The people
sitting in the crowd, who prior to karaoke coming along did not enjoy people
singing, would now applaud these karaoke performers. This has inspired
many people to get on stage and perform whether they are on key or not.
When karaoke was first created, it was aimed primarily towards business
people. It quickly became a hit and spread all over the world.
As the technology for karaoke has advanced it has allowed karaoke to become more popular than ever before.
It is no longer just for the bar scene. Many restaurants have karaoke
nights geared towards the entire family having fun and singing.
In Japan, they have what is called a karaoke box, which is
basically a closed door facility containing speakers, microphones, a karaoke
machine, and places to sit inside a sound proof box and sing. These boxes
are primarily a roadside facility and move from
one area to another with ease by placing them on a trailer.
Around the world there have been businesses that open shops housing several sound proof rooms
along with the karaoke equipment. This allows the karaoke singers to sing
as loud as they want without disturbing anybody. These types of facilities
quickly became a hit with families who enjoyed singing. It is a fun night
out for the whole family and is fairly inexpensive.
As music videos became more popular, this helped karaoke grow in popularity
because the music was reaching a wider audience base, thanks in part to channels
The technology that is used for karaoke has changed drastically over the
years. In the beginning, it was just records and tapes that had the vocals
removed; there were no words on a screen. With the invention of the laser
disc, came the first version of karaoke that had the lyrics displayed on a
screen. The equipment was quite expensive and not readily available for
producing your own karaoke songs. People's choices for song selection was
limited to what the producers of the karaoke discs released.
With the invention of compact discs, karaoke began to grow rapidly. As
more computer owners purchased CD recorders, the popularity of CD+G (compact disc plus graphics)
grew immensely. CD+G is a compact disc that includes the karaoke song and
also includes the lyrics and usually some kind of background images display