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ENTERTAINMENT >> HISTORY OF KARAOKE
OUT LOUD
Karaoke History There’s Much More to Karaoke than Meets the… Ears W RIT TE N BY C A MERON COBB
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hat better way to spend four minutes than by belting Celine Dion to a room full of people you don’t know? And is a night out really a night out if it didn’t include someone’s off-pitch performance of “Don’t Stop Believin’”? Whether you love it or hate it (or hate that you love it), karaoke is a musical, multicultural experience that needs to embarrass everyone at least once. No matter if you’re more likely to end up centerstage in the spotlight or as a stranger safely hidden in the audience, explore the origin of how this sing-a-long sensation all started. Daisuke Inoue, born in 1940, became enamored with the art of music following his parents’ move from Osaka to Kobe, according to The Appendix’s “Voice Hero: The Inventor of Karaoke Speaks.” Beginning with drums in his junior high’s brass band, Inoue quickly discovered a passion for making music. The kind of passion that fuels the all-knowing adolescent to ditch home right after graduating high school and set off to become a drummer. After a nine-year life lesson Inoue noted as full of “many tales and no regrets,” the 28-year-old decided to push those plans aside and venture back to Kobe to live with his parents (also, he ran out of money). 86 |
OUR TOWN MAGAZINE
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2018