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Shigeichi Negishi, inventor of the karaoke machine, dies at age 100

Though never patented, Negishi’s 1967 Sparko Box was the first device to facilitate what would become a wildly popular musical pastime

Shigeichi Negishi, the Japanese entrepreneur who invented the first-ever karaoke machine, died on January 26, The Wall Street Journal reports. Negishi, who loved singing along to the radio and television programs, eventually had an employee wire together a speaker, tape deck, and microphone, testing the prototype with an instrumental version of Yoshio Kodama’s “Mujo no Yume.” After a trial run, he took the MacGyvered machine home and “convened history’s first karaoke party with his wife and children,” as Alt put it. Though Negishi never patented the Sparko Box, he spent a period of time as a traveling salesman of the contraption, driving around Japan and demonstrating his invention at bars, restaurants, and hotels.

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