Musical identities through a Malaysian singing reality tv show: a study of selected contestants from Big Stage season 1/2018 / Sissy Imann Mohammad Kamil

Reality TV singing competition sets a platform for aspiring singers to showcase their talent and launch a professional singing career. This type of shows has been dominating television schedules in the twenty-first century with offers in the form of primetime audience and recording contracts. In Malaysia, shows like Bintang RTM, Akademi Fantasia, and more recently Big Stage have developed a trend following over the years. While plenty of studies have been done from the audience’s perspective, yet research from the point-of-view of the participants is scarce. While there are multiple elements that constitute a singing performance, this research focuses on the musical identities formation of five singers through participation in singing reality TV shows within the framework of vocal identities and musical elements. Singing competitions are commonly designed with specific challenges to push the creativity and musicality of the participants outside of their comfort zone. This research involves five subjects out of the total ten participants from Big Stage Season 1 due to its unique requirements which only allows participation from singers who have an established presence in the music industry. The primary data collection involved semi-structured interviews based on the self-perception of each research subject. Interview results were then triangulated with document analysis of weekly concerts which looked into the vocal style, musical elements, judges’ feedback, and total marks obtained. Post-competition career growth data were collected as an indicator of the subject’s current relevance in the industry. This research presents a hybrid juncture of musicology and music psychology by analysing elements of both areas to consolidate findings that are technically concise, while still retaining the individual musical process behaviour and experience. Findings from this research observed that all subjects underwent musical identities maturity phases throughout the competition. However, the phases of identities formation differ between individuals: some were still at the discovery phase, while others went through identities self-negotiation. It was discovered that the musical challenges imposed throughout competition pushed them to re-evaluate their musical approach, while giving opportunities to experiment with different musical identities and concepts. This study does not reflect the music industry as a whole, yet it allows for findings and analysis that are deeply personalised through each individual's perceived experiences. The findings from this research aims to provide a practical reference for aspiring singers to evaluate the upside of participating in a singing reality TV show by providing an outlook on its impact on musical identities formation.