YAY it was Friday! Which could only mean, it was Elysium Cabaret. Welcome to the weekend! Plus it was St. Patrick’s Day, one of the most popular international holidays. Considering St. Patty’s Day requires no shopping or gifting, but instead only drinking and eating but mostly drinking, what is not to love about it? Just wear green so you don’t get pinched, and maybe you might catch a leprechaun or find a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Many of our audience showed up in their greenest finery and enjoyed green beer, green champagne, green cupcakes, and more… all courtesy Jilley. Paul looked splendid in his green tuxedo complete with beard. DJ Gunner was spinning the tunes, warming up the audience as the talent were stretching out and warming up their muscles backstage.
Sebastain with Storm, Ray, Jo, Lily and Mona
Firedance – Edit
This dance was so incredibly complex, I suppose I will start at the beginning. It started with a magical golden curtain that had orbs of golden light floating gently. Through the translucent curtain we could make out the shadows of dancers as they started to move. The curtain fell away and the dancers, revealed, gambolled forward. Three vibrant dancers doing lively step-dancing, then joined by three very handsome men. The men and women each took turns dancing for each other then freezing in pose as the other returned the challenge to move, until all were dancing together. The mover work on this had to be such a nightmare, as the precision of the couples dancing was so exacting, even having the female dancers dancing in a circle around the male dancers. This performance was visually stimulating, the colour scheme dazzling.
Sebalicious said he picked this particular music because it is Celtic, but off the beaten traditional Irish green path, having been performed in real life by Maria Pages and Michael Flatley. Seb said this is one of his favourite dances that he has choreographed. “It is a LOT of fun. I like anything Celtic, being a descendant, and I really like the mix of Spanish and Celtic in this dance.” We like it too! It is a unique and refreshing take on Celtic presentation.
Nara with Gracie
Guardians of the Woods (Celtic music)
Two beautiful fairies in an enchanted world of mushrooms, sparkling fireflies, lush green grasses, and a backdrop of a mystical waterfall. The fairies danced with elegance and grace, drawing in their audience to delight them with lithe ballet, moving in the eloquence of fantasy. This was an exquisite dance that finished with the two fairies rising and flying off into the waterfall. Very clever mover work to accomplish that! The song, like the set, costumes and choreography was gorgeous. I especially loved the delicate wings which were translucent and beset with delicate sparkles.
Nara commented that she has always loved Celtic music. “I can feel myself absorbed into the tones. It is easy to let creative juices flow just listening to that genre of music.” She found perfecting the flying part of the dance to be most challenging. She did a great job with it, I will saying, making flying smooth and having the dancers flying in the right direction and position is not easy. As beautiful as this dance was, it is not Nara’s favourite that she has created. She said, “I do not consider this one of my best acts, as I am truly not inspired to create ballet-type ones. I will leave that, in future, to those who are so talented in that field.. *grins* But will add … I loved building the set. Oh and blame the music hahaha.”
Special thanks to Tristan Lyonesse for the pics of Nara’s dance.
Jo with Sebastain, Winnie, Kyshra and Melvis
Dock of the Bay – Otis Redding
We love this song. And Jo created a dock on a bay with ships and boats and seagulls, and people sitting, soaking in the sun, and simply enjoying the day on the dock of the bay watching the tide roll away. I love the pelican! Each person then got up in turn and joined in the dance. The choreo was just perfectly suited to the music. As the dance continued, the day time sky changed to a glorious deep yellow sunset. It was a beautiful transformation.
It was jolly good fun to hear of the challenges this dance faced Jo with, and how she dealt with them. She said this dance was cursed, and everything that could go wrong did. “I keep ambient sounds off at my build platform so it took me a while to discover there were issues. The sea lion barked intermittently, and for the life of me I couldn’t stop him. He was descripted, scrubbed and I even put a sound file called “silence” in him, all to no avail. Even one of the top sound experts in SL who I consulted couldn’t help me fix him, so he was replaced by a seal which I did manage to muzzle. My flying seagulls squawked so they had to be replaced by soundless birds. But the static seagull on the deck has to be silenced with a HUD, and as soon as I rez the set I have to turn his sound off manually.
“By now most of the set was linked, and I packed the various bits into the Stage Manager rezzer. Done. Ok, time to rez and check it. What the heck? A few pieces appeared but not the houseboat, anything linked to it or the set template. In edit mode I saw them there but the whole thing had turned 100% transparent.” OMG I have had that happen to me on a set! SO frustrating! Jo continued, “I edited that, and they appeared. But every time I rezzed the set they came out transparent. I finally found the culprits: 9 transparent objects, each named mesh plane that were part of the houseboat. They seemed to have no use that I could see, even though they were scripted for seating, so I carefully unlinked them one by one from the linkset and deleted them. Now it worked and that was the end of the set creating disasters, thank goodness.” Sometimes linking to a prim that contains a certain script can make all your prims invisible or can even change the texture. That leads to baldness.
About the dearly-loved ever-popular classic song, Jo had this to say: “This song is a classic of the sixties, a beautiful, mellow song, written and sung by a very talented young man who sadly died far too soon. I’ve always loved it, and the wonderful images of the San Francisco Bay he evokes with the lyrics. I hope the dance is entertaining and fun but yes, it is more than that to me. ”
Eva with CowGrl, Dyhann Gibbs, Misha, Nadi, Rose and Tia Henhouse
In My Head – Techno Remix
Eva once again proves what a clever little sorceress she is, with her stage magic. This dance started out with gals in white dresses dancing. Their party was then crashed by a rival group of hiphop dancers, who came to liven things up and show the ‘nice girls’ how it is really done. The white dresses color-changed more than once, which I love. That is so cool! One of these days I will have to learn how to do that cause it looks like fun so is a must-try. The dancers all had a dance-off, and then all came together and danced as a team.
What was Eva’s greatest challenge with this dance? “The choreo! I spent days and days and days on the choreo – I think more than I have on any other dance. I try to stretch myself, what I’m comfortable with – and this dance did that. It had sexy, it had street – and the remix has an amazing beat. It’s a good thing I’ll be performing it again for the matinee, because this dance isn’t done talking to me… still needs to be developed. One reason I chose it? I think I’m firmly on the ‘good girl’ list at Elysium… going to shake that up sometime!” OH EVA! Shivers me timbers… I have goose skin! Can’t wait for the earthquake, to see what you do next! Going to be a naughty girl? *rubs hands together and grins wickedly in anticipation*
Nadi with Eva Harley, Usher Piers, Jo Balogh and Sebastian.
Mike Oldfield – To Be Free
Sweet! I loved this song, and just love the stags to each side of the set. Nadi came from the back, dancing to the front, and joined with her dancers in such lovely, gentle and precise choreography. It was a pleasure to watch the refined movement. The colour scheme of white, pink and blue complimented the palace in the background, and was so soothing on the eye. The performance was relaxing and spiritually uplifting.
Nadi said that she fell in love immediately with this song the first time she heard it on YouTube. “Sometimes music puts ideas in my head, and I have to write a dance to the melody or the words inspire me.” The words “To be free” touched her imagination, and she found the dance very easy to put together because of this. Nadi hoped the audience listened to the words of the song, and were entertained by her interpretation of it. “That is always my wish when I dance.”
Jilley
Celtic Fairy Music – Emerald Fairies
Oh, what an enchanting world Jilley drew us into with this dance! Everywhere you looked, there was something for the eyes to feast on, including Jilley herself. She was a little dancing flower spirit, a beautiful flower fairy, and her use of particles and colour in this dance was mesmerising. I would love to smoke a fatty then sit back and watch this dance, but I don’t suppose that is necessary because the movement and sparkles and ripples and shimmers and waves of colour were enough that no smoking was needed to absorb completely into this performance.
Jilley told me she did not like this dance, and had nothing to say about it. Well, I think she is her own worst critic because I loved this dance, and so did everyone else. It was fascinating, like stepping into a dream of moving colour. So creative. And her costume was absolutely gorgeous.
Babypea with Gunner, BB, Pan and Kyshra
Psy Vs. Takeo Ischi
Absolutely insane. Some of the craziest fun I have had on stage in at least a week. While going about me searches for some Irish music, I got to searching for polkas which led to yodelling (I have a massive passion for yodelling) and then well I happened upon this totally awesome amazing twisted bizarre song. It was Gangnam Style meets Takeo Ischi, a Japanese yodeller who can sing in chicken bawks and make them sound simply amazing. The result of blending these two songs was absolutely delightful, and called for salty Irish maids, chickens, and of course a leprechaun. Together, we oppad Gangnam style and combined that with Irish step dancing for a really fun, silly and totally hilarious St. Patty’s Day celebratory dance that was at least as much fun for us as it was for the audience. Complete with particle rainbow and pot of gold at the end!
Jilley with the Audience
Gaelic Storm – Irish Party in Third Class + John Ryan’s Polka
The Dubliners – Whiskey in the Jar
Flogging Molly – Devil’s Dance Floor
We greatly appreciate our audience… our friends and family who come out to share in our creative expression of music. I call them our frams. We thank them for their applause, their kind and generous tips, and their supportive IMs. Part of how we say thank you is by inviting them up on stage to dance with us at the end of our shows. This week, our crowd dances were brought to us by Jilley. She created the most fabulous St. Patty’s Day set, complete with heaps of clover and lots of Irish charm. The dances were a riot! Such fun choreography, that saw us all falling down drunk by the end! What a blast… thank you Jilley! Everyone danced and had a wonderful time, then adjourned to Paul’s secret venue, The Ram… an Irish pub… for two more hours of partying and dancing, featuring DJ Gunner playing the crowds’ requests. A really great time, and what a fun way to celebrate the holiday!
Elysium Cabaret 