- Megasztár
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Megasztár - Voice of the Year is a Hungarian voice talent television series that started in 2003 and is currently in its fifth season, on TV2. While it is widely considered an unlicensed clone of the British television show Pop Idol (and sometimes even referred to as Hungarian Idol), TV2 maintains that it is a distinct format created by SBS management member Christoph Buerge.
Contents
Impact
Overview
The show is notable for not only stirring up but, in the end, radically changing the pop music world in the Hungary of the 2000's, often criticized to lack original talent that Megasztár set out to find. As Péter Geszti said during the third season finale, "Hungarian pop musicians are afraid of Megasztár singers because the latter are extruding the former from the pop market."
Impact on record sales
Indeed, three albums from Megasztár singers already finished in Hungary's official top ten sales list [1], and by 2005, five out of the top ten sellers were Megasztár-related albums [2].
Show Format
Yearly timeline
Auditions
Auditions for each season are organized in the summer. In these, entrants (the number of whom reached several tens of thousands by the third season) each introduce themselves in front of the jury (already familiar with their entrance application, consisting of a CV and a number of songs given as favourites) with a song either selected by them or the jury, who may either ask them to stop or continue based on their performance.
Semi finals
From the auditions altogether fifty people are selected, who, in groups of tens, participate in semi finals in the autumn, singing one song selected by themselves, and with the jury selecting the best two each time to participate in the finals. The jury also had to pick an additional singer each time to participate in a special semi final, where two more singers were also picked up for the finals, but this time the audience voted for the singers via phone calls and text messages (and in the third season, via the internet as well).
Finals and elimination
The finals are organized in the spring, where finalists are eliminated one by one, based on the audience's calls and text messages. In the first season, the singer with the least votes was eliminated. In the second season, the jury chose one singer to continue from the two with the least votes. In the third season, the jury chose a singer to continue from the three singers with the least votes, the remaining two having to sing a 'duel' for the audience's votes.
Prizes
The grand prize for the winner of the first season of Megasztár was a contract at a record company. Because of the show's high popularity, however, most singers of all seasons got their own contracts in the end. From the second season, winners were also promised a car and a flat in a newly built apartment block, the latter leading to some controversy as the flat which the second season winner was promised to get by the end of 2005 was still not built in May 2006. [3]
The Jury
Former jury members
Lead jury members were also the show's producers in charge of music.
- Tamás Z. 'Pierrot' Marosi (1st and 2nd seasons)
- Péter Novák (3rd season)
- Gyöngyi 'Soma' Spitzer, jazz singer (from 1st to 3rd season)
- Gábor Presser, musician, member of legendary 70's Hungarian rock group LGT (from 1st to 3rd season)
- Tibor 'Settenkedő' Bakács, critic (from 1st to 3rd season)
- Barna Pély, jazz musician and singer of the group called United (from 1st to 3rd season)
Current jury members
- Enikő Eszenyi, actress (since 4th season)
- Tamás Mester, singer (since 4th season)
- Gábor Presser, singer (since 5th season)
- Sándor Friderikusz, TV presenter (since 4th season)
- Miklós Fenyő, singer (since 4th season)
Finalists
First season
- Veronika Tóth - winner, Official site
- Ibolya Oláh - runner up Official site
- László Gáspár - 3rd place Official site
- Evelyne Kandech - 4th place Official site
- Vera Schmidt - 5th place Official site"Thank You" -Liveshow new music video
- Edmond Géza Nagy - 6th place Official site
- Leslie Szabó - 7th place Official site
- Barbara Schmidt - 8th place
- Henrietta Dér - 9th place
- Zoltán Mujahid - 10th place
- Dorina Galambos - 11th place
- Gergő Aczél - 12th place
Second season
- Ferenc 'Caramel' Molnár - winner Official site Official Fan Club
- Tamás Palcsó - runner up Official site
- Gabriella Tóth - 3rd place, younger sister of first season winner Veronika Tóth Official site
- Dániel Torres - 4th place
- Csaba 'Boogie' Gál - 5th place Official site
- Eszter Bartók - 6th place Official site
- Ádám Bálint - 7th place Official site
- Tamás Pál - 8th place Official site
- Levente Bella - 9th place
- Tímea Kovács - 10th place Official site
- Orsolya Pflum - 11th place Official site
- Ivett Kósa - 12th place
Third season
- Magdolna Rúzsa - Winner Official site
- Ferenc Varga - Runner-up Official site
- Angéla Póka - 3rd place Official site
- Eszter Szabó - 4th place Official site
- Tamás Kontor - 5th place
- Bíborka Bocskor - 6th place Official site
- Anikó Baktai - 7th place
- Péter Puskás - 8th place Official site
- Mónika Hoffmann - 9th place Official site
- István Varga - 10th place
- Szabolcs Oláh - 11th place Official site
- Izabella Széles - 12th place Official site
Fourth season
- Viktor Király - Winner
- Dávid Fekete - Runner-up
- Krisztián Lakatos - 3rd place
- Lüszi Tóth - 4th place
- Tamara Bencsik - 5th place
- Nguyen Thanh Hien - 6th place
- Károly Szecsődi - 7th place
- Sonia Nkuya - 8th place
- Attila Ásós - 9th place
- Imre Balogh - 10th place
Fifth season
- Renáta Tolvai - winner
- Attila Kökény - runner-up
- Melinda Szíj - 3rd place
- András Kállay-Saunders - 4th place
- Djordjevic István "Giorgio" - 5th place
- Yvette Lakatos - 6th place
- Dávid Szeleczki - 7th place
- Anna Patai - 8th place (youngest competitor, age 11)
- Bence Gusztos - 9th place
- Fivérek - 10th place
- Adam's Comedy - 11th place
- Andreas Csonka - 12th place
- Bernadett Varga J. - 13th place
External links
Categories:- Singing competitions
- Hungarian music
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