I have become an inordinately enthusiastic consumer of karaoke tracks of Hindi cinema music. I record one practically every day and post it on various social media accounts. The particular fascination for me, apart from some transient desire for an applause or two, is the astonishing confluence of technologies in the whole enterprise.
A karaoke track is not just a karaoke track. Those who make these tracks more often than not use synthesizers to produce tracks as close to the original as possible. Synthesizing sounds itself is a remarkable set of technologies. Most of these karaoke producers scroll the original lyrics which is yet another layer of technology. They then upload it on the new via a desktop or whichever other form be it a phone or a tablet or a laptop, all results of brilliant technologies. Then comes telecommunications as in high-speed internet via broadband, yet another layer of rather complex technologies. I am not even getting into the wired and wireless aspects of transmission, which are also high-tech. After jumping so many technological hoops I park myself in from of my desktop and microphone to record songs and then upload them on various social media platforms, which in themselves are brilliant examples of technological advancement.
It has been a longstanding annoyance of mine that we as a society do not adequately acknowledgement the backbreaking among of work that goes into creating a dazzling array of technologies by engineers toiling away in obscure recesses. What is worse is that these technologies are then deployed by those who do not their arse from their elbow to spout absolute non-sense. In a cruel irony the current prevailing contempt globally for pursuit of excellence in any field through hard work and respect for science, intellectual curiosity and facts then manifests itself with the help of technologies which are the very result of that passion for hard work, science, intellectual curiosity and respect for facts.
Coming back to my current obsession with karaoke I find it to be a powerful tool to keep myself centered and anchored. Of course, it helps that more often than not I sing passably well.
