Has this been done before?

Hi there, I am new to SL and loving it.

What I would like to do is purchase land to build a club for musicians/singers and hold Karaoke/Open mic nights. People could sing through voice chat or play instruments etc.. It would all have to be LIVE performances.

My question is, has this been done before, if so, is there any big names in this genre I could check out.

I just remember years ago, I would go into voice chat rooms and play cover/original songs for peopel to listen to/live critique. It was much fun.

I would love to make this happen for SL musicians. Is there any interest in this ?

Thanks

Pgyongyi

Search the events tab for live music - it's not at all a new idea, there are live performances, including open mic nights going on all the time. Having said that, most of the live performances I've been to have been fairly well attended so I'd guess there's demand for more.

Live performance is usually done using a stream, usually Shoutcast I think. Voice chat just isn't good enough quality, and you can't stop people interrupting. Someone will probably be along in a minute who knows a lot more then me and can point you in the right direction.

Good luck.

There is a karaoke club in SL, the name of which escapes me atm. Just do a search on karaoke and see what comes up.

The hardest thing you have to deal with is internet latency. Just using the voice chat of SL will work if the singer is also playing the music.

If I can get what I'm trying to say in words.

Back when I was trying to get my partner to play SL with me, we would go to live music events together. Listening to the same stream on her computer and mine there could be as much as a 20 second difference. If you have a Karaoke singer trying to sing live with a music stream the effects will probably be comical ... more so than normal

Live chat is also out of sycn with each other. Not by the amout music stream can be, but 1/2 to 2 seconds is normal. This is why you tend to talk over each other sometimes. Again, going back to my personal experience, I played Everquest and WoW with my partner, we have used Teamspeak and Ventrilo a lot for groups and raids. I got to where I would mute my partner on Ventrilo so I did not hear that funny echo. I could hear her whan she spoke n the room next to me and again about a second later on the headphones. Once I muted her on Ventrilo, I just heard heard her the one time.

Even with all the possibilities of bad out of sync music and voice, I know I have seen SL jam sessions before. Different musicians in different places getting together. I don't know how they do it but I am pretty sure there is a 3rd party application being used somehow. I wish I knew more to help you.

There are probably a dozen open mic nights a week at various venues. If you're interested in playing at one and can't find one in the Search > Events > Live Music tab, send me an IM inworld and I can send you details on a couple. SL music venues don't usually accept voice performances. It's usually only audio streams. You an do audio streaming for free with several tools, including Butt. (I just love saying that.... it's short for Broadcast Using This Tool.)

As to how musicians jam with each other, there are two methods. One's using something like Ninjam (discussion about using it here http://slmc.myfastforum.org/forum33.php). Another is to use relaycasting -- one musician streams audio, the next downstream picks up the stream, adds to it, sends it on, etc. until the final musician in the relay sends it out to the rest of the listeners. (much better explanation of it, complete with graphics here http://www.lovelymachine.com/Dolmere/2008/03/what_is_relaycasting.html)

thanks for the replies people. What I am thinking is just if a person wants to sing, they play their own music and sing to it. All from the same source. Thats how I used to see it done in the chat rooms before. or if somone wants to play a guitar or somethign and sing, thats what I meant. I am a big time noob when it comes to land in SL, is there a HUD or something that gives you all the options for streaming, and all of that stuff when you buy land?

thanks