Info about Karaoke

---

Karaoke in Japan

Karaoke is one of the biggest social things to do in Japan. The name karaoke comes from the words for empty and orchestra in Japanese - kara and okesutora.

A drummer in Japan named Daisuke Inoue first invented karaoke after customers in the utagoe coffeehouse that he worked in requested that he record some of his songs so they could sing along on a vacation. It would make sense that the customers of this type of coffeehouse would request a tape for this because in an utagoe coffeehouse people sang along with the music being played. Inoue realized the potential with this type of recording and decided to make a special tape recorder that plays the music after a one hundred yen coin was inserted.

The recording machines were leased out so that restaurant and hotel owners could let their customers participate in the fun without needing to purchase a machine. It was after the invention of the karaoke box, that karaoke really took off. This type of karaoke venue provides rooms that allows guests to rent for a specific amount of time. Inside the room is the equipment necessary for a fun night of karaoke and sometimes includes an all you can eat food or drinks special.

At first, cassette tapes were used to play music for karaoke, but over time it has become much more common to use a dvd karaoke machine or, even more recently, a computer with karaoke software and all of the songs already on the hard drive. Now with games like rock band you can sing along to the music and have the game system evaluate your performance for you.

In Japan, the karaoke box first showed up in 1984. Considering how important this now is to social life in Japan, it is hard to believe that this has only existed since the mid eighties. Karaoke is a great option for social entertainment because it can be fairly cheap and is a fun way to meet other people This is definitely a better option than using a dvd karaoke machine at home.