The $100,000 Name That Tune
Host: Jim Lange
Announcer: John Harlan
Run: 1983-1984, Syndicated
Play: Two contestants are pulled out of the audience, a man and a woman. Three games are played, worth
10, 10, and 20 points. The person with more points plays the Golden Medley for a shot at a Tournament
berth.
Melody Roulette: Jim spins a wheel up to seven times, once for each tune played. Whoever names the
tune gets the money. The wheel has four $100 spaces, one each of $200-$300-$400-$500. The outer
wheel also has a "double" covering 1/8 of the wheel. Thus, a contestant could possibly win $4000 in
this game. The first to get four tunes gets the ten points and keeps the money. If no one gets four tunes,
a tie-break tune is played. Soon into the run, the wheel was spun only once, and had two each of
$250-$500-$750-$1000 and the same DOUBLE space. Only the winner got this money.
Tune Countdown: Contestants have 20 seconds to listen to tunes, buzz in and guess them. Each tune is
a point. Most points wins, with a sudden death tune if necessary. Ten points to the winner, plus a small
prize. This may have been played only on the aired pilot, because the Golden Medley Showdown is nearly the same thing, so they substituted...
Tune Topics: Five topics are shown, one of which will be played. Best-of-five tunes wins the points and a
prize.
Bid-a-Note: Contestants are given a clue (year, top position on Billboard, a pun leading to the title or artist)
and the bidding is opened. Starting from seven, contestants bid as to how few piano notes it will take to
guess the tune. Right answer winns a point, wrong gives it over to the opponent. The minimum bid is one
note. The first to get three points wins 20 points, and a bigger prize.
After the three games, woever has more points wins. If there
is a 20-20 tie, a sudden death tune is played to see who wins the day.
Golden Medley: The contestant has 30 seconds to name 7 tunes. Each tune is worth $250 in prizes, with
a bigger prize for all seven. Passes are allowed, but a wrong answer ends the game. All players who get
all seven tunes move into the monthly Tournament of Champions, for the $100,000.
Tournament:
In the tournament, players are grouped into four or three. Melody Roulette is replaced with the Qualifying
Round. The first two to name two tunes are through to the game. Wrong answers carry the harsh penalty
of sitting out the next tune.
Tune Topics and Bid-a-Note are played for 20 points (a silly doubling, to be honest) and the final game is
the Golden Medley Showdown. Both players play Tune Countdown for 30 seconds, most tunes gets 40 points.
The winner of the game moves to the Finals, and the loser gets a decent prize.
The table shows the points for each format. The doubling effectively makes the Showdown the only game
worth winning, since winning it either wins the Championship, or at least gets a tie.
| Two players | 3/4 players |
| Roulette for 10 | Qualify Round |
| Topics for 10 | Topics for 20 |
| Bid-a-Note for 20 | Bid-a-Note for 20 |
| Showdown for 40 | Showdown for 40 |
After all of this, the loser gets a trip to Hong Kong (great runner-up prize) and the winner gets $100,000 in
cash and prizes. When the bell rings for the end of the Showdown, or the tie-break tune is done, the theme
starts up, a BIG bouquet of balloons falls, etc, and the Pontiac Fiero is rolled out, along with another wave of balloons come down.
This Tournament cycled once a month, and at the end of the shows' run, they ran the Super Tournament.
All of the $100,000 winners came back, and first played in the Preliminary Round. In order to advance,
not only did the contestant have to win their game, but finish the Golden Medley as well. The tournament
proceeded as normal, and Elena Cervantes won an additional $100,000 in prizes.
This was the only Name That Tune version I got to see, both in first run and in reruns. It wasn't until 2001, when VH1 ran Name That Video. The idea of the 1970s version of the show is there, but most of the excitement is gone. Spinning the Roulette wheel once instead of up to seven times sucked all the fun out of the game. Tune Topics was basically just a best-of-five tune naming contest with quasi-clever clues. The game really comes through with Bid-a-Note and the Golden Medley. Two exciting contests.
The $100,000 tournaments might have been more exciting as well, but for two things. Firstly, they were run every month, which means you get seven or eight winners qualified to play. Secondly, the Golden Medley Showdown most often was decided about 15 seconds in, when one contestant was ahead by 7 points.