Karaoke Word origin

The Japanese word stems from the words kara (空), meaning "empty" (as in karate, "empty hand") and oke which is short for ōkesutora, meaning "orchestra". The words together make a contraction literally meaning "empty orchestra".

This term used to be slang for media where pre-recorded music substitutes for a live performance, thus it is written in katakana. The term karaoke can be interpreted as "virtual orchestra" because one can specify a key to the music and start singing along without the presence of a live band or orchestra. In the United States, the word is often pronounced as /kerioki/, and in Britain /kaerieoki/. The Japanese pronunciation is /karaoke/. (These pronunciations are in IPA.)

It is a popular urban legend that Karaoke is Japanese for "tone-deaf". This is not true, though it is amusing.

History of Karaoke

It has been common to provide musical entertainment at a dinner or a party in Japan, as in the rest of the world, for a long time. This tradition appeared in the earliest Japanese mythology. For a long time, singing and dancing remained one of the few adult entertainments in rural areas. Noh was initially played at a tea party and guests were welcomed to join in for a cheer or a shout of praise. Dancing and singing was also a part of a samurai's education. It was expected that every samurai have a dance or a song they could perform. During the Taisho period, Utagoe Kissa, (literally song coffee shop), became popular and customers sung to a live performance of a music band.
The karaoke industry started in Japan in the early 1970s when singer Daisuke Inoue (Inoue Daisuke) was asked by frequent guests in the Utagoe Kissa, where he performed, to provide a recording of his performance so that they could sing along on a company-sponsored vacation. Realizing the potential for the market, Inoue made a tape recorder that played a song for a 100-yen coin. This was the first karaoke machine. Instead of selling karaoke machines, he leased them out, so that stores did not have to buy new songs on their own. Originally it was considered a fad which was lacking the "live atmosphere" of a real performance. It was also regarded as somewhat expensive since 100 yen in the 1970s was the price of two typical lunches. However, it caught on as a popular entertainment. Karaoke machines were initially placed in restaurants or hotel rooms; soon, new businesses called Karaoke Box with compartmented rooms became popular. (See below "Public Places for Karaoke" and "Terms of Karaoke" for a description of karaoke boxes.) In 2004, Daisuke Inoue was awarded the tongue-in-cheek Ig Nobel Peace Prize for inventing karaoke, "thereby providing an entirely new way for people to learn to tolerate each other."
Early karaoke machines used cassette tapes but technological advances replaced this with CDs, VCDs, laserdiscs and, currently, DVDs. In 1992, Taito introduced the X2000 that fetched music via a dial-up telephone network. Its repertoire of music and graphics was limited, but the advantage of continuous updates and the smaller machine size saw it gradually replace traditional machines. Karaoke machines connected via fiber-optic links to provide instant high-quality music and video are becoming increasingly popular.
A big karaoke-box building in Tokyo, which was featured in the movie Lost In TranslationKaraoke soon spread to the rest of Asia and then to the United States in the 1990s. Facilities such as karaoke bars or "KTV boxes" provided the venue, equipment and software for amateur singers to entertain (or "torture") each other.
Its popularity has spread rapidly to the United States, Canada and other Western countries. Some people still regard it as "hokey" and simply a method for the intoxicated to embarrass themselves, but as the novelty has worn off and the available selection of music has exploded, more and more people within the industry see it as a very profitable form of lounge and nightclub entertainment. It is not uncommon for some bars to have karaoke performances seven nights a week, commonly with much more high-end sound equipment than the small, standalone machines noted above. Dance floors and lighting effects are also becoming common sights in karaoke bars. Lyrics are often displayed on multiple TV sets around the bar, including big screens.

It is also growing in popularity in the United Kingdom, with Martha Lane Fox, the founder of lastminute.com, helping finance what is being touted as a chain of upmarket Karaoke venues, called Lucky Voice.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karaoke Karaoke