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Media Publishing & Television
9X launches celebrity music show Mission Ustaad
Ankit Ajmera | agencyfaqs! | Mumbai, November 26, 2007
9X, the Advertisementgeneral entertainment channel from INX
Media, will launch its music based show on December 1. The bi-weekly show is
called Mission Ustaad. The channel will broadcast episodes every Friday and
Saturday at 9 pm for 11 weeks. The show will feature eight professional
singers, paired together. Each pair will compete against the other to emerge
the winner. The unique feature of this show is that it will showcase originally
composed music along with popular numbers.
The target audience for the show will be people from SEC A, B and C classes in
the age group 15-35 years. Recently, SaharaOne launched a celebrity based music
show called Jhoom India. However, Jhoom India is a reality show and
features pairs of a celebrity and a professional singer. NDTV Imagine, which
will be launching in January 2008, also has a music show called Dhoom Macha
De with 11 celebrity singers. This show doesnt have pairs and the singers
will compete with each other individually.
So far, non-celebrity music format shows, such as Saregamapa on Zee and
Indian Idol and Star Voice of India on STAR TV, have been immensely
popular. agencyfaqs! sought the opinion of well-known media planners to gauge
whether the celebrity based music shows will become as popular as the
non-celebrity music shows.
Kajal Malik
Kajal Malik, vice-president of Interactions, Lintas Media Services agency,
says that people enjoy listening to good music whether comes from an already
known singer or an unknown one. All the singers on shows such as Saregamapa
and Indian Idol were unknown, but their singing was professional. The reason
for the success of these shows is the strong relativity factor of the audience
with the singers. The singers form the face of the crowd. When people see them
performing on TV, it forms an aspirational connect and they want to back the
singers by participating through activities such as SMS voting. That is why
such formats work so well for the channel as far as TRPs and the audience
participation factor is concerned.
However, the celebrity based show formats will be good in garnering high TRPs
for the channel, and they may also attract similar audience participation.
Malik says that celebrity based dance format shows such as Nach Baliye on
STAR TV and Jhalak Dikhla Ja on Sony did well, but they were not as popular
as Saregamapa and Indian Idol in terms of audience participation.
Malik says that Mission Ustaad has big singers such as Kailash Kher and
Naresh Iyer (Rang de Basanti), so it is likely to attract a lot of attention
from the audience. But as far as audience participation is concerned, the
market will have to wait for the results.
Malik is not very confident about the show format of Mission Ustaad. She is
sceptical about whether the originally composed lyrics and music concept will
cut much ice with the audience. It is an original concept, but according to
her, the more people listen to a track, the more it grows on them. She uses the
example of Dard-e-Disco (from the film, Om Shanti Om) and says that not
many people would have found it appealing the first time. But because they have
watched the film, they have got used to the song. Repeated listening raises the
comfort level with any music track.
Malik is of the view that if 9X had promoted the original compilations in the
market much before the launch of the show, they would have gained in popularity
by the launch date. But because 9X has not done this, one will have to wait and
see how successful this format will be.
Divya Radhakrishnan
Divya Radhakrishnan, vice-president, The Media Edge, and another senior media
professional who wished to remain anonymous, are of the opinion that the new
music compilations may not achieve the same popularity with the audience.
Radhakrishnan says that shows such as Saregamapa, Indian Idol and Star
Voice of India have lots of drama because they are essentially talent hunt
shows. But Mission Ustaad will be a pure singing competition. The big singers
on the show will help gain attention from the audience, but audience
participation remains a big question.
Radhakrishnan adds that despite getting celebrities, the music shows on 9X and
NDTV Imagine may not deliver TRPs as high as Saregamapa and Indian Idol
because both channels are new.
Music director and singer AR Rahman, lyricist Javed Akhtar and actor Lara Dutta
will be the judges for Mission Ustaad. The singers include husband and wife
Roop Kumar Rathod and Sonali Rathod; Kailash Kher and Mahalaxmi Iyer, actor and
singer Vasundhara Das and Mohit Chauhan of Silk Route fame and Roo-ba-roo
singer Naresh Iyer and Shweta Pandit. Actor Simone Singh will host the show.
Endemol India is producing Mission Ustaad for 9X. The channel has also
partnered with the United Nations to create awareness about the UN Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs) across India for the End Poverty 2015 Millennium
Campaign.
Each week, the four pairs will sing specially composed and popular songs based
on a theme linked to the UN MDGs. The audience will be asked to vote for the
best pair. The judges will proclaim the most popular pair as the Jodi of the
Week based on the number of points they score and the number of votes cast in
their favour. The pair that makes the biggest impact week after week will be
declared the Ustaad Jodi.
The prize money and all profits received from SMSes on Mission Ustaad will be
contributed to charity for the development of the UN MDGs in India. The best
original compositions by the various pairs will be compiled in an album aimed
at further spreading the message of the UN MDGs.
© 2007 agencyfaqs!
Regards Pavan
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