Digital Key Control

The digital key control is a very useful feature found in virtually all karaoke hardware and software players. It allows the key of the music to be adjusted up or down by small increments (steps) without affecting the tempo of the song. While making extreme adjustments can degrade the audio quality, the change is usually not noticeable. Songs with prominent background vocals are typically the ones that give away the fact that the key control is being used.

It's surprising that so few karaoke singers utilize the digital key control even when they know that it exists. They will strain to sing songs that were recorded in a key that is to high for their voice or pass up songs that they would like to sing because of the key it's in. Many would be surprised at what a difference just a couple of steps on the key control can make.

Some singers have specific versions (brand) of karaoke songs that they prefer. There is no guarantee that the karaoke host at the venue you attend will carry the specific versions you like. For this reason many singers will carry their own karaoke discs with them. Fortunately, the majority of karaoke hosts do not mind playing those discs. This situation provides for a unique opportunity for those who use key control on a number of their songs.

It is now possible to have the songs on your karaoke discs pre-adjusted to the desired key control setting. This means you no longer need to instruct the karaoke host to set the key control or worry about them forgetting to do this. The world's most popular CDG disc burning software, Power CD+G Burner, has recently added a feature that lets you set the key of each song track before the burning process begins. The adjustment is in half steps just like with virtually every karaoke machine.

Many karaoke hosts are now using a laptop and karaoke song files to run their shows. While most of these hosts still have the ability to play CDG discs they may also allow you to bring your songs on a USB thumb drive in the MP3+G format. It is also possible to pre-adjust the key of these songs with the Karaoke Sound Tools software.

Article by Richard Wise.