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On our television channels, there
are a lot of music reality shows, where contestants perform every week to be
judged by a jury and their audience. I ask myself, are those judgements fair or
they are just ‘business judgements’. Business judgements in the sense that
sponsors advocate for people to vote for their favorite contestants, whether
they are performing well or not, and the contestant with more votes win. On our
blind side, there more you text, the more the sponsors ‘eat’. Do people vote
because they are affiliated to contestants or they vote because they monitor
the progress of contestants right from the beginning of a contest?
Church choirs organize music
competitions and in the end, Christians go home doubting the ‘sense of
Christianity’ in the adjudicators. I have been on several panels and some of my
colleagues did shoddy jobs, which greatly affected the right jobs. At some
instances, scores needed to be annulled so that a re-scoring could be properly
done – taking much time and resources.
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How fair will it be if contestants go all this way and receive an unfair judgement? Will the jury, whether professional juries or ‘street juries’ be doing good to the industry? However, I believe the unfair judgements are either caused by the event organizers, the professional judges and the street judges.
Most organizers of music contests
should try and equip the event with the much resources; such as qualified
juries. If organizers really want to build the industry, they may not have to
bow to every ‘deed’ of their sponsors. I believe there are sponsors who want to
sponsor ‘quality’ and not just make their money from the blind texters. Again,
organizers of music awards systems that seek to award industry players, over a
particular period, should provide voters with audiovisuals of the particular performances,
pieces or works that qualified each contestant into the contest. We should not
ask panel judges, who will happen to be professionals in the industry, score
over 30% and ask texters to score over 70%.
Organizers also need to prioritize
what they expect from the contests they organize. They can also set a criterion
for the adjudication. The Bands of America adjudication system
is a criteria reference system, in which a band showing proficiency in
particular criteria, or meeting certain criteria at a certain level, falls
within a scoring range. It is the position of Bands of America that music is
the more important aspect of the performance, with marching as the presentation
and visual enhancement of the program. Similarly, more emphasis has been placed
on the effectiveness of the general effect judges than on fine-line perfection
of the performance judges. The weight of the numbers places 60% of the value on
music and 40% on visual, as well as 60% on general effect and 40% on
performance. Each judge is assigned a specific area on which he or she focuses,
ensemble and general effect judges are located at a vantage point from above
(i.e. press box), individual performance judges are located on the field.
Once, I was on the bench with
others; they scored a choir very low because they believed the choir made some
mistakes in their performance. Yes, the choir had some challenges interoperating
their PITCHES, but their NOTES were well interpreted. All these judges didn’t
know the difference between a NOTE and a PITCH. Some performance juries have
less technical knowledge on what they are asked to judge. Most of them are on
the seat because they are popular personalities. When they are there with a
technical person on the bench, the technical person sometimes becomes the ‘bad –
judge’, when he/she gives a true reflection of the performance.
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Some of the objectives why musical
competitions or contests are organized are to provide an opportunity for contestants
to meet, share and demonstrate their musical achievements and creativity; as
well as to evaluate and reflect on musical achievement and creativity in a
constructive focused way. Others are to encourage the study and performance of
music, whether formally or informally; and to foster and promote a lifelong
interest in music as a basic human experience. I await a period when the
contestant who secures the last position will appreciate the adjudication and
understand why he/she chalked that position, and be encouraged to work more
another time. Let not make our musical judgements kill the industry and its
patrons’ spirit.
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