Startups battle for $50,000 and killer buzz

UJAM
Founders: Peter Gorges, Axel Hensen
Headquarters: Bremen, Germany (U.S. office in Los Angeles)
Founded: April 2010 (product has not yet launched)
Runner-up for TechCrunch Disrupt Award

Those little made-up melodies trapped in your head now have an outlet: UJAM.

UJAM's Web application lets users transform their musical inputs into fleshed-out songs. There's a lot of technical whizbang on the backend, but the interface is simple. Using their computer's built-in microphone, users whistle a tune, sing a song, or just hum a few bars. With a few clicks on the application -- all the tools are intuitive -- the tune is converted into a full melody. You can play with its beat, hear it played back on a piano, or break out the strings and give it a full orchestral treatment.

A consistent crowd-pleaser, this German start-up wowed the judges. "I've never seen anything like that pulled off. This is really hot shit," raved Chris Sacca of LowerCase Capital, whom UJAM's founders lured into singing onstage. "This brings democracy to music creation."

"We've seen a project that all of us that we want to play with it," said angel investor Yossi Vardi.

While the basic application -- not yet launched -- would be free, UJAM plans to sell users add-ons additional effects and instruments. The creators also envision a marketplace for user-generated content, with stylistic effects, instruments, and actual songs available for download. They're also toying with options like corporate sponsorships and selling APIs to developers that want to incorporate UJAM's technology on their sites.

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