Karaoke Contest Rules
- Participation
- The Karaoke Contest is open to all attendees and all ages.
- To participate, you must commit to attending all 3 rounds of the competition: Preliminaries on Friday, Semi-Finals on Saturday, and Finals on Sunday. However, if you are not selected to move on to the next round, you are not required to attend any further competition rounds. Exact times will be announced as the Events schedule is finalized. Please let us know if you will not be able to participate due to scheduling conflicts and we will remove your name from the competition.
- Sign Up Entry Form: all contestants are required to sign up prior to participating. Please see the ‘Sign Up’ section below.
- Participants agree that any violation of the rules is grounds for removal from the contest. Any violations of rules, either implicit or implied, is determined by Kawaii Kon and its crew, and are the final arbiters.
- Song Selection
- Songs can be selected from any genre; while anime-related songs (in English or Japanese) are preferred, it is not required.
- The Karaoke Contest is a family friendly event; please keep your song’s lyrics and content in mind during selection and keep them at a PG rating or lower.
- Songs used for the contest must not exceed 4 minutes in length; longer songs may be used but must be edited / trimmed before the competition by the contestant to fit within that limit.
- The music track used must be an instrumental version only with no primary vocal track present; backup vocals on harmony or chorus sections are acceptable however.
- Music tracks: please see the ‘Sign Up’ section below on how to submit your music tracks for the contest.
- Judging
- The judging panel will be composed of up to 4 judges / judging groups, and will be announced at the start of each judging segment.
- At the end of each judging round, the judges will select the following to move on to the next round of the competition:
- Preliminaries – up to 8 contestants to move onto the Semi-Finals
- Semi-Finals – up to 4 contestants to move onto the Finals
- Finals – 1 overall winner of the contest
- Scoring by the judges for each round will be based on the following categories:
- Vocal Quality: volume, pitch, vocal control, voice clarity.
- Stage Presence: ability to put on a performance, energy of the contestant, ability to ‘fill the stage’ with the performance.
- Crowd Response: audience engagement, excitement, and interest will be a scored factor.
- Song Difficulty: changes in pitch or tempo, notes out of a standard range, ease / difficulty of song choice.
- Sign Up
- Sign Up Entry Form: the entry form for the Karaoke Contest will go live approximately 2 weeks before Kawaii Kon – Suggest you set a reminder and bookmark this page to make sure you don’t miss it!
- If you are singing with a background music track, it can be provided in the following ways:
- via a URL to a karaoke video track
- a link to an MP3 file uploaded to a public file transfer website that does not require a membership to download files
- you may opt to bring the track with you at the time of the event
- you may sing your songs acapella
- Indicate your choice on your entry form and provide links to video URLs or files there, too.
- Prizes: the winner of the Kawaii Kon Karaoke Contest will receive a trophy and a free 3-day pass to next year’s Kawaii Kon.
Karaoke Preliminary Rounds
- Preliminaries Round – Friday, Room 311 (time TBD, please check the schedule)
- Participation is on a first come, first served basis, and is limited to the allotted panel duration. Please make sure to show up early to better your chances in participating in this year’s Karaoke Contest.
- To allow as many participants as possible, no feedback will be given by the judges during the competition.
- The last entry will be taken approximately 20 minutes before the end time stated on the schedule to allow for judges to deliberate over all performances.
- All Semi-Finalists will be announced at the end of the Preliminaries.
Karaoke Semi-Finals
- Semi-Finals Round – Saturday, Room 311 (time TBD, please check the schedule)
- Semi-finalist contestants are required to sing 1 song: singers may opt to use the same song as sung in the previous round.
- Please report to the Karaoke Contest Event Coordinator 15 minutes prior to the start of the semi-finals to turn in their song selections. If you are running late or need accommodation, let us know and we’ll try our best to meet the request.
- Each contestant will be given an opportunity to introduce themselves and the song they are singing on stage prior to their performance.
- After each performance, the judges may provide contestants with limited feedback on their performance.
- Once all contestants have performed, the judges will confer and announce those contestants moving onto the Final round of the competition
Karaoke Finals
- Finals – Sunday, Room 311 (time TBD, please check the schedule)
- For the Karaoke Contest finals, all contestants are required to sing 2 songs for judging; as before, singers may opt to use any songs sung in the previous rounds as their selections.
- Finalist contestants will report to the Karaoke Contest Event Coordinator 15 minutes prior to the start of the finals to turn in their song selections. If you are running late or need accommodation, let us know and we’ll try our best to meet the request but note that with the limited number of finalists, our flexibility is also limited, so please plan accordingly.
- Contestants will be given an opportunity to introduce themselves and the first song they will be singing on stage prior to their performance. Then the contestant will then be allowed to introduce their second song. After both songs are completed, the contestant will have a short opportunity to ask the judges on improvements and any other impressions.
- Once all contestants have performed, an entertainment interlude will occur to allow the judges time to deliberate and review their scoring.
- At the end of the event, the judges will announce the winner of the Kawaii Kon Karaoke Contest!
