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The July contest is now history and my instrumental song Shir Hashirim ended up number 8 in the Top 10. I noticed that usually songs with some vocals tends to place higher, but there have been many instrumental songs (with no vocals) in the New Age/World channel that did quit well, so it can swing either way depending on other strengths such as composition, arrangement and production quality, etc.

I'm curious if any A&R types could have predicted which songs would end up in the Top 10 (or Top 5) before the start of the quarter-finals. The July quarter-finals started on the 25th, so anytime before then no one could have known for sure which songs would end up in the top, though there might be plenty of clues based on at least several factors.

Here's a few factors (criteria) I would use if I had to predict a winner before knowing the results of a semi-final or subsequent grand prize contest result.

1. After having heard many (or most) songs in a given channel, (e.g. New Age/World), one could compare relative quality of songs especially on things like: composition, arrangement, production, creativity/originality and performance.

2. If the artist has posted similar songs before (in previous months) in the same channnel that have finished at the top, that might be another positive indicator. It means the artist is probably focusing on their area of "strength" and is targeting their music for a specific kind of genre market. This principal works regardless of genre/channel.

3. Does the artist's song image (photo or artwork) reflect the theme of the genre their in? For example having a country or folk image in New Age/World channel won't look authentic and convincing. It likely to confuse fans and cause the artist to lose votes.

4. In general is there anything offensive or off-topic about the song presentation or production? Offensive words or images might ruin an otherwise great song concept, even if the production is flawless. Off-topic is not always so obvious, but I've heard some great songs that really belong in other channels, so they could end up being removed and/or moved to another channel before the quarter finals.

5. Adding points for each of these critical factors:
Composition - some songs sound great in the first 15 seconds, but where does the song go after that? Does the same melody or chord progression keep getting looped around for the rest of the song, or does it move forwards dynamically to keep my interest?
Arrangement - does the song use a good mix of instruments, voices and other parts, or does it fall short on the overall arrangement?
Production - How good is the production quality? It should be virtually broadcast quality or what's known as "radio ready", but even if very simple it can should still be a very clean mix with a well mastered production to compete against all the other songs in the same channel.
Creativity/Originality - Is this song a "cheap" copy of everything I've heard before in this channel or is it truly fresh and original?
Performance - Is the performance of this song poor, average, very good or outstanding? A bad song could have a great performance and a great song could be very poorly performed, etc.!

I might assign points for each of these criteria and then add them up... or at least be aware of them while deciding which songs also "move" me the most. But even if they don't move me personally, they may still move other voters, judges and fans, so this part gets tricky.

As you can imagine, a lot of songs will earn points for various aspects of their strengths, but the key is to select the songs which have the highest overall scores going for them.

In conclusion:
I think it's a mix of "art & science" to be able to accurately predict which songs will make it to the top for any given contest channel. I'd like to challenge myself, and anyone that wants to try this, in an upcoming "Challenge" which I'll post on our new Challenge forum! It's also a good way to learn to be more objective when selecting and preparing one's own songs before entering them into a contest channels.

Michael