Karaoke for Beginners

At fifty-two years old, for the first time in my life, I went out and tried Karaoke. I didn’t plan it or seek it out in any way. It just sort of happened.

I was trapped on a ship during a cruise with nothing else to do, so I decided to get a drink and sit down in a lounge where the cruise staff were setting up microphones and speakers for Karaoke. I don’t know if the bigger mistake was going into this particular lounge or getting the drink. Regardless, inhibitions were lowered and bad decisions were made.

I sat with my wife and several friends as we watched the stage get set up. We chatted about what songs people might be singing that night, and we started speculating on what music we would select if one of us decided to take a turn at the microphone.

The first volunteer (contestant?  victim?) was a woman wearing a gray knitted sweater and sporting a hairstyle that immediately had all of us speculating on the number of cats she was currently concealing in her stateroom. Her song choice did not win her any new friends either, as she started out the night with her rendition of My Heart Will Go On. Not a completely appropriate song to choose to sing on a cruise ship.

She finished her song on a high note – the wrong high note, but still, she really belted it out – and the audience clapped her off the stage. As she left, waving at her adoring fans with gleeful abandon, singer number two waited patiently in the wings to take her turn.

My one drink became two, and then three as the songs continued on stage with a variety of people from all over the vocal talent spectrum. My friends and I dutifully applauded at the end of each number, rewarding the performers’ bravery, if not their actual ability.

Then, without warning, a couple of the friends I was sitting with decided to join in the festivities. They walked up to the podium where the host was taking song requests and began searching through the music selections. They each picked a song, then came back to our table to wait for their turn to sing.

One of my friends asked me if I was going to sing. I told him that was never going to happen. I said that I was afraid I would get up on stage and completely embarrass myself.

I think my argument might have worked a little better if not for the fact that at the exact same instant, a bearded gentleman who weighed about three hundred pounds stood up at the microphone and began to scream (literally scream!) “Tiptoe Through the Tulips.”

When the song was done, and our ears had stopped ringing from the electronic feedback the big man had created, my friend patted me on the shoulder and said, “You need to go up and pick out a song.” 

Realizing I wasn’t going to be able to weasel out of it, I stood up and trudged over to the host’s podium. I hung my head and shuffled my feet as slowly as I could manage. I felt like a condemned man making his last walk to the gallows.

When I reached the podium, the host looked up at me, smiled, and asked what I was looking for. I told him, “the back exit.”  He laughed, told me that he didn’t think he had that one in his computer and asked me to try again.

“What do you have?”  I asked him, resigned to my fate. He showed me the list of songs available. There were thousands, so I just latched onto the first one I recognized and thought might be within my extremely limited vocal range.

Twenty more minutes went by while each of my friends got up and sang. They did pretty well. It wasn’t a professional concert, but they didn’t vomit and fall of the stage either, so all in all I give them a win.

Then it was my turn. I heard my name called over the speakers and I got out of my chair … and crawled under the table. It took two of my friends and a passing waiter to pull me out from my hiding place, and I still think I could have held on if that stupid table had been bolted to the floor. But, because I didn’t want to make my entrance while dragging a cocktail table behind me, I let go and decided to walk up on my own.

The music began almost the moment I touched the microphone: “Piano Man” by Billy Joel.

I killed it.

By “killed it,” I of course mean that I murdered the tune and the lyrics almost beyond the ability of the police to identify the body, then I left the pieces buried in a shallow grave in the backyard.

As I walked off the stage in shame, I noticed a man dabbing at a small trickle of blood that had begun to leak from his right ear.

Oddly enough, despite my shame and embarrassment, I was smiling. I think I actually enjoyed myself. It was kind of exhilarating to be up there on stage, and even though I was awful, nobody in the room seemed to care how terrible I was. Everyone was still having a good time.

I returned to my table in a surprisingly good mood and ordered another drink.

I don’t think I will be shouting out “Tiptoe Through the Tulips” at the top of my lungs anytime soon – I’m not that brave – but I might be convinced to stand up behind the microphone again sometime in the future. Maybe next time I can do something by the Beatles. Or maybe the Eagles. I bet I could really do some damage to “Hotel California.”

And yes, I think “damage” is the right word for that sentence.

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