Follow our guide to host a karaoke party that will have your friends singing both lyrics and praises.
Invitations
Tell your friends about your karaoke party by sending an Evite invitation, like the free musical invitation below or another free “Birthday Jam” invitation. Then check out our invitation gallery for more designs.
Decorations
Karaoke parties are all about the decorations. Karaoke party rental stores can provide you with essential party supplies like a karaoke machine, a microphone and lots of CDs with your favorite songs, but you’ll also want to create a stage and great lighting.
Use a silver or red throw rug to section off a part of your living room as the stage area. Position the stage in front of a door to a bedroom or a large closet, and let that serve as the dressing room. Hanging up a silver shower curtain or sparkly door beads in the doorway lets your singers take the stage with style.
Hang party lights around the stage for extra razzle-dazzle, and use a bright lamp as the singer’s spotlight. You can create a nightclub atmosphere in the room by hanging a disco ball from the ceiling and positioning card tables and folding chairs around the stage so your guests can sit and enjoy the show. Boas, hats, funky glasses and wigs also help your guests get into character.
Etiquette
As the host, it’s your job to bring out your guests’ inner divas while respecting their wishes if they’d rather just watch. You can encourage shy folks to sing back-up to give them an opportunity to get used to being on stage.
If you’re faced with a lot of stage-frightened guests, turn them all into karaoke kings and queens by starting off with group sing-alongs. Get everybody singing and dancing together by choosing classics like “YMCA” and “Greased Lightning.” Your guests will appreciate a list of easy-to-sing hits.
Finally, during guitar solos and flubbed lyrics, give your singers a hand by clapping and cheering to fill any awkward spaces.
Activities
Take a tip from karaoke bars by creating songbooks featuring all the available songs, so guests can look through to pick songs they’d like to sing.
Put out notecards where guests can write down their names and song choices. Play the selections in the order you receive them to keep things orderly. If some guests start to hog the machine, switch to passing the microphone around in a circle and letting every person have a turn.
Give out prizes for best song, best impersonation, biggest crowd pleaser, wackiest song choice and most enthusiastic performance.
Food
Since karaoke is the main attraction, you can keep your food simple. Room-temperature buffet foods like hummus and pita, chips and dip, cheese and crackers, and raw vegetable platters let your guests snack between songs without disturbing performers.
Put out bowls of salted nuts, olives and fresh berries on each table for guests to enjoy while watching the show. Finish with bite-size desserts like brownies and assorted cookies.
Drinks
Same Old Song (serves 4)
- 4 ounces sweet vermouth
- 2 ounces dry vermouth
- 4 ounces gin
- 4 ounces orange juice
- 4 teaspoons lemon juice
- 4 dashes orange bitters
- 4 orange wedges
Fill a cocktail shaker halfway with ice cubes. Pour in vermouth, gin, juices and orange bitters. Shake well and strain into 4 cocktail glasses. Garnish each with an orange wedge.
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