The Singing B-log

The summer season of “The Singing Bee” was a big success. We were America’s number one new show and got loads of positive feedback. Now that fall is here, we’re revving things up to a whole new level. “The Singing Bee” kicked off the new season last night in its all new time slot (Tuesday at 8PM on NBC). The millions who tuned in got the first look at a bunch of enhancements we’ve made to the show.

On the entertainment front, we are starting off each episode with musical guests. So far, we’ve booked Barry Manilow, Toni Basil and the Village People. Theme nights will also become a key element. A sneak peek at some of the themes you can look forward to—a Lennon/McCartney night, a Halloween theme night, One Hit Wonders and even a Green episode.

We’re also cranking up the competitive dynamic of the show. The champion from each episode now returns to defend the title. So, an initial win on “The Singing Bee” could lead to a string of repeat visits.

If you’re an avid “Bee” watcher, you may also have noticed on the new season premiere that we’ve made the game more intimate by having fewer contestants on stage at the start of each episode. We also added some new games to test the players’ lyrical knowledge in interesting ways, while spicing up the at-home viewer experience.

We’ll continue to fine tune “The Singing Bee” to make it the best show possible. Questions, comments, suggestions or favorite misheard lyrics are all welcome in the comments section below.

Bee well,

Bob

While driving with my teen-aged daughters and their friend, I had the good fortune to look inside their fascination with Disney's “High School Musical" franchise.

It seems that Maggie and Julia have memorized every last word of every "HSM" song, and they’re well on their way to memorizing the sequel. They take this job very seriously. If one of the girls fumbles over a line, the others quickly chime in with the correct lyrics. Some of the trickier lines require a group effort to reach consensus. As I listened, it dawned on me that most of us have experienced a similar cultural obsession in our formative years. Before "High School Musical", there was "Sound of Music", "Grease", "Tommy", "West Side Story", and so on.

Our show, "The Singing Bee," actually draws on this phenomenon. Most people have some amount of music from their teens committed to memory. I think this is because our teen years are when we have the time to listen to music constantly, and to concentrate on it, rather than dealing with “real life” while the music plays in the background.

For most of us, adulthood signals responsibilities, careers, and families, and an end to compulsive music memorization. Music becomes a part of our lives, rather than our reason for being.

However, there are a select few whose passion for learning lyrics goes beyond their teen years and sticks with them into adulthood. These lifelong learners, who memorize the music of their generation, plus that of earlier and later generations, make up the impressive group who ultimately become “Singing Bee” contestants and champions.

As we prepare for the new "Singing Bee" season (September 25), expect a few new additions for the Fall. We are planning to have musical guests in studio for the opening sing-in, plus our weekly "Singing Bee" Champion will return the following week to face a new group of contestants. Who knows, we just might find the Ken Jennings of music lyrics.

I was recently in Orlando, Florida, which happens to be the home town of our always entertaining "Singing Bee" host Joey Fatone. The locals there couldn’t be more enthusiastic about Joey and the spark he brings to our show. I was in Orlando to shoot a new interactive golf quiz show, "Rules of the Game" which airs this Saturday, August 18th at 4pm EST on CBS. While the "Singing Bee" tests viewers’ knowledge of music lyrics, our CBS golf special is an interactive viewer challenge focused on golf rules. The interactive part of the show is located at www.golfdigest.com.

After we wrapped production on "Rules of the Game," I took my youngest daughter, Julia, to watch the space shuttle launch at the Kennedy Space Center. Buzz Aldrin, the legendary astronaut and regular participant at our Deer Valley ski event, had arranged for our attendance. The launch was a phenomenal spectacle, even from three miles across the water. If you ever have the opportunity to see a space shuttle launch in person, do not miss it. The Space Center is only about an hour's drive from the Orlando Airport.

Some of the other NASA launch guests we were with got to talking about the "Singing Bee." Given the occasion, our conversation veered into misunderstood space lyrics, and now, I bring to you the Singing B-log misunderstood lyric of the week - the Elton John classic “Rocket Man.”

There’s one line in “Rocket Man” that I have never been quite sure about. It sounds something like, “Rocket Man burning down his shoes while I’m at home.” Of course, that doesn’t make much sense. So I looked into it, and it turns out the exact line is actually, “Rocket Man burning out his fuse up here alone.” That makes a lot more sense, doesn’t it?

If you’ve got a space-themed lyric that you want clarified, drop it in the comments section below and we’ll look into it. Until next time…

There are a lot of game shows on TV that fall into the “anyone could do that” category. The mechanics of these games depend on the chance and luck. “Deal or No Deal” is an excellent example.

Then there are the “I could never do that” shows. These are the shows that demand talent, dedication and perhaps even pre-show cramming or exhaustive rehearsals in exchange for on-air glory. In this group, trivia shows like Jeopardy, and talent contests like “American Idol.”

“The Singing Bee” sits somewhere in the middle. Call it a “I’m pretty sure I could do that” show. Practically everyone knows SOME song lyrics. It could be a few favorite songs from your teen years, every Grateful Dead song ever recorded, or the popular dance club hits from your early twenties. Whatever the niche, most people have a window in music history in which they could hold their own in a Singing Bee-style song lyric challenge.

But it is a very, very rare breed that knows ALL the words to ALL the popular songs from ALL the popular genres across the last fifty or so years. And THAT is precisely the type of person who makes a great “Singing Bee” contestant.

The screening process for the Singing Bee challenges candidates with a written test for song lyric knowledge. It’s a hard test. Those who pass the test meet with a producer from the show who decides whether they’ll be able to demonstrate their knowledge once they get on-camera under the bright studio lights.

Not every contestant sings like Mariah. In fact, it’s sometimes more entertaining when they don’t. On The Singing Bee, as we like to say, “you don’t have to sing it well, you just have to sing it right.”

If you think you’ve got the knowledge to make it on the Singing Bee, test yourself next time you’re listening to the radio in the car. Turn on a classic rock station (to find some songs that you might not have heard in a while) and start singing along. If you can nail the chorus word for word on five songs in a row, you’re on the right track.

Either way, you’re invited to tune in and see what we’ve got in store for you on this week’s show. Inside scoop—it’s an All ‘80s episode.

After "The Singing Bee's" strong premiere last week, we have been at the center of a whirlwind of activity. NBC has pulled out all the stops on its promotional and publicity campaign around our continued summer run, and on Monday morning, Ben Silverman announced at the TCA Press Tour that the show is going to be on the network's fall schedule.

The phones are ringing off the hook with media requests for our host, Joey Fatone. Joey, of course, is splitting his time between "The Singing Bee" and his "Dancing With the Stars" tour. He's working hard to fulfill all of the requests, and I love him for it. Sometimes the guys who make hosting look easy don't get as much credit for their work as they should.

So, for the record, Joey deserves a lot of credit!

And are they any critics in the audience tonight? Let's have a nice round of applause for them. If you had told me two weeks ago that our nation's TV critics would rally behind "The Singing Bee," I might have argued with you. We always figured that the viewers would get on board, because the show is full of great music and it's a lot of fun to play along at home. But it's nice to be one of those shows that resonate with the public and the critics alike. It's a good thing too, because this week we are in Beverly Hills at the TCA Press Tour to meet the critics face-to-face.

We're getting lots of interesting feedback on the show from various groups of viewers. Some people want to see more of our singers, some want to see more of our dancers (the Honey Bees) and some want to see more of our band (Ray Chew and the Buzz).

There's only so much material that we can include in each episode, but we're looking at ways to let everybody see more of their favorite parts of the show online. Look for more on that front soon. In the meantime, please leave your favorite misheard lyric in the comments section, and then tune in to see if we use it on an upcoming episode of the show.

Walking through Times Square last year, all the signs for "The Spelling Bee" on Broadway got me thinking. If there's a spelling bee on television, and now a spelling bee show on Broadway, this new version has to have some singing in it. But, wouldn't that make it a singing bee? And if so, what, exactly, would a singing bee be?

Well, I figured, if a spelling bee is people on a stage, demonstrating their spelling ability, then a singing bee might feature people on a stage, demonstrating their singing ability. But, there are already a few pretty good TV shows about that. Maybe you've seen them.

But what if you consider that spelling is not so much a matter of talent as it is a matter of knowledge. On the knowledge side of singing, what would happen if we challenged people to prove that they know the words to popular songs? You can look back to the famously misheard Jimi Hendrix lyric "Excuse me, while I kiss this guy" (it was really "kiss the sky") to see that there's fun to be had here. Or, you can click over to the website www.kissthisguy.com, which has built a cottage industry around the misheard lyric phenomenon.

So, with the basic concept of a singing bee in mind, I called my friend Phil Gurin, one of the most prolific game and variety show producers in the business, and uttered two words. I said, "Singing Bee." Phil said, "Got it." (We communicate in shorthand.) Then a bunch of stuff happened. Flash forward to this Tuesday, and our new variety game show, "The Singing Bee," will premiere on NBC at 9:30 pm after "America's Got Talent." As the promos so elegantly intone, "Bee there."

Do you have a favorite misunderstood song lyric that you'd like to share? Let the comments fly, please. And make them funny.

Next week on The Singing B-log... Tantalizing only-in-Hollywood buzz (sorry, I couldn't resist) from behind the scenes of the show.