Freestyle Music Guidelines (WYYC2018)

About Music

All contestants in the Freestyle Divisions, please read the following guidelines carefully.

The Cultivation of Wholesome Youth

All contestants must behave in an upstanding, appropriate manner. The player must consider their conduct in their freestyle, music content, and behavior on the contest premises.

Music must be suitable for an audience of all ages (including young children and their parents). Contestants who use inappropriate music (with inappropriate words in all languages, obscene language, and inappropriate lyrical content explicit and implied; in addition, in the case that a beep/silence/etc. is used to cover the word(s), if the coverage of the word(s) is judged to be incomplete or insufficient the player may still be subject for disqualification) may be disqualified by judges. If the contestant is unsure if their music is suitable, they may request that the judges review it beforehand.

Every year there are contestants who are disqualified or nearly disqualified. If there are questionable words or content in your music we highly suggest that you choose a different song. Again, your music must be suitable for an audience of all ages (including young children and their parents) and that guideline will be strictly enforced.

More information concerning disqualification is listed at the bottom of this page.

WildCard Round (3o seconds) Music

In the WildCard Round, the contestant may only choose their music from among the official list of designated songs. Please indicate and submit your chosen track number in the Music Information Form. In the case that the contestant has not submitted a song choice, they may choose it at the Music Reception Desk on the day of the contest, or the music staff will choose a song randomly.

More details, including the WildCard music option list, can be found here.

・If you need to inform the Music Staff of something

You will need to inform the music staff if you have any important requests for your music. Some examples are, if there is an extended section (more than a few seconds) of no sound in your music please do not stop the music until the end, or if your music’s recording volume is low and you need to request them to play it louder, etc. Any such requests should be submitted in written form on a paper memo to the music staff before the division starts. Be sure to also write your full name, Division, and Round (Semi-Final or Final) you are sending the request for on the same memo page.

Regarding Disqualification for Inappropriate Music

If it is brought to the attention of staff and/or judges (by contestants, staff, authorized persons, audience members, judges, etc.) that a contestant’s music is inappropriate, contest staff will promptly call a meeting of the relevant division’s judges (all of that division’s judges, supervising management staff), to check the contestant’s music.

If half or more of the meeting members (ex. in the case of 4 people, 2 people or more) judge the music to be inappropriate, that contestant will be disqualified from the relevant division.

No disqualifications will be made after the results for each round (Prelim, Semi-Final, Final) are announced (unless the violation is particularly bad).

If the music is so excessively bad that the continuation of the performance is judged to be inappropriate, the music can be stopped mid-performance by the judgement of any one person of the following: head judge, division judges, contest supervising management staff, venue authorized persons. (If after checking it is found that there is no problem with the music,  the contestant can do their freestyle a second time at the end of the relevant division.)

Judges will use the submitted song itself as the primary material subject for judgement.

After it has been decided that the song is inappropriate, the judge in charge will attempt to inform the relevant contestant before results are announced. However, we cannot promise as such if there is not enough time before results are announced, or the relevant contestant is out of the venue or does not respond the summoning announcement.

At the time of an announcement if the contestant desires to explain the circumstances, we ask that they report promptly to the person in charge. However, even if they provide reference from the song’s composer, lyric writer, record company, and/or lyric notes, such materials may not be considered. The judges final decision will be based on what was heard in the originally submitted music.

The decision of the judges is final and after a disqualification is decided it will not be reversed in any case.

 

(Last Update: 2018.6.18)