1. I did the first song like I normally do to check levels and mics. Ouch. A lot to adjust for the first time live while trying to sing. I should have put someone else up first as the guinea pigs. It would have been a lot smoother and I would have gotten to enjoy my song instead of missing half of it trying to adjust kJams/computer/mixer/mic levels all at once.
2. I didn't hook up the mouse right away. I've been using multi-touch a lot and mostly like it. But it's not suitable for running shows. Too sensitive. I accidentally hit the next button scrolling around to do something else. And then didn't realize that I could back up to the song I screwed up with the previous button. But the guy was ok with it and it was near the end of the song instead of the beginning. The mouse took care of that error for the rest of the night.
3. I let the last song of the first rotation actually end instead of pausing it with slip in hand for the next person. I just couldn't get them added before it finished. Spent the rest of the night adding new singers and then moving them up in the rotation to be in front of me so they wouldn't get skipped. I'm not sure that being able to back up even after the last song in a rotation is done wouldn't be a good thing. What if I accidentally hit "next" on the last singer instead of "play"? I'd have to pull the same trick with adding the singer and adjusting them in the kj rotation so they were in front of the real start of the rotation all night long.
Similarly, is there a way to deal with skipped songs that I'm just not finding? For instance, someone tells me that they have to step out for a minute and can I push them back a few songs. Normally I would just hold their disc until they get back, let them sing, and then put them back in the rotation where they were originally...which works in kJams by adjusting the kj rotation so long as they're not at or near the end of a rotation.
Anyway, the night was a huge success. People were suitable impressed with being able to just tell me what they wanted to sing instead of always filling out a slip. I was impressed with the time saving features that I did find for finding a song and assigning it to a new singer with a right click (or an existing singer) instead of using the target mode all the time.
We ended up with 29 people in the rotation (25 on the first go-around) which is a huge rotation for this show, and a nightmare to keep up with using my old method, effective as it was for me. This is just soooo much less hassle.
Great job, Dave. I've been dreaming of doing karaoke your way from the first show I did 5 years ago. Can't wait for the kJams Server!


