“There’s karaoke every night of the week somewhere in Dayton,” said Nancy Sell, owner of Nancy’s Karaoke. Sell has been hosting karaoke at local bars including Therapy Cafe, Michael’s Dining and Jazz, Blind Bob’s and Smokey Bones for more than 10 years.
She said she has not seen a decline in people wanting to belt out a tune, even hosting an all karaoke wedding recently.
But the karaoke industry is not having as much luck in other markets according to a recent story in the Los Angeles Times.
They report that karaoke isn’t what it used to be. The industry is in a “protracted decline,” according to music trade group NAMM, formerly known as the National Association of Music Merchants. Live karaoke clubs are losing some of their bread-and-butter wannabe stars to living room video games and online streaming services.
But Vicki Wilson, owner of local retailer Roadhouse Karaoke, said the Wii and other video games haven’t hurt their sales to karaoke hosts. “Most of the people that are really into karaoke, they’ll practice at home, but they still like to go out.”
Curt Delk, co-owner of Soft Rock Cafe in Centerville, said that home games don’t offer the array of music choices available at most live karaoke events.
Delk contends that any perceived slip in karaoke’s popularity is due to the proliferation of venues offering the experience.
“Karaoke is growing to so many bars on so many nights,” he said. “Every Tom, Dick and Harry thinks he’s a karaoke host all of a sudden.”
Delk said some bars might be stretching the niche karaoke audience too thin by trying to offer singing every night of the week.
“When we opened it was unheard of to do five nights a week. Now I’ve got competitors doing seven nights a week,” he said.
Piracy, not loss of interest, is the biggest threat to the local karaoke industry, said Sell, who has been offered a hard drive containing an entire collection of music for $200.
She said she has about 12,000 songs in her collection, all legally purchased. “Some people claim to have 80,000 songs,” she said. “Either they have a rich aunt, or they are downloading illegally.”
Hosts with bootleg collections are able to charge less for their services, which appeals to struggling bars and restaurants.
“(Bar) owners don’t care where the music comes from, but they should,” Sell said.
There can be real legal consequences for venues that allow illegal karaoke tracks to be played according to David Grimes, Chief Operating Officer of Chartbuster Karaoke, based in Tennessee.
“If the venue owner’s ignore it its not going to go away. It’s something that could land some of them in hot water.” Grimes said that intellectual property owners can come after venue owners for both copyright and trademark infringement.
Grimes said although exact industry numbers are hard to come by, Chartbuster Karaoke loses millions of dollars annually as a result of piracy.
According to the Los Angeles Times, since hitting a peak in 2002, annual sales of karaoke machines and software have plunged 80 percent to barely $40 million from $200 million.
Wilson says those numbers don’t match Roadhouse Karaoke’s experience. “My sales have declined some, but I think that’s mainly due to the recent economy.”
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2124 or kwedell@coxohio.com.
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