Sunday, August 28, 2016

Cat Boucher Makes Smashing Success with the World-Music Festival #secondlife #music

The performers in today's part of the festival came up 1-2-3-4-5 and each one was going off into worlds which left mainstream behind decades ago for a bad show.  Mainstream never changed but they did and it was glorious.

Maestro Michi Renoir came up first and right away he set an exceptional pace because he did not start with any 'soft stuff for the chicks' which I found never worked with the chicks anyway but he didn't go anywhere near that tonight so his show grew and grew into the best I have ever heard from him.  I have heard the Maestro many, many times and there's no doubt to me this was the best I have heard.


This is a far view of Michi Renoir on the Tiki stage Fredja built for the show.  Without Fredja's generosity with her sim and her support, the show would have been far more difficult and there was immense synergy created with her working on it as well as Cat.

There was also a naked woman created and she's at center left on the stage but, take it easy, she is Michi's tip jar.  She's not a slave girl as she does have a head but there's nothing in it except maybe LSL scripts to make her do what she does.  Tip:  we don't ask as it might be a Japanese slave girl and we have seen a glimmering of what their robodolls do.

Thank you also to Sam who is a sweet girl but a bubbly personality and she is often at performances at the MusikCircus supporting Cat.


DD / Dimensions Digital came up next and she brought her musical world to you in a way entirely different from the Michi Renoir ways but using her vivid imagination in new directions.  The World-Music kept building and more and more people kept coming.  That didn't stop and through the day it became one of the most well-attended shows I have ever seen in Second Life.

I regrettably did not get a picture of DD because I crashed when I tried.  Paula Cloudpainter commiserated when I got back to say 'crashing isn't so bad if I ate least get the pic first' but it doesn't always go that way (larfs).


Psiquence came up next and PSI is the power of mind which goes beyond that which is easily explained.  He's a German composer and his music is easily approachable but not so easily explained.

Perhaps you're asking what's so worldly about this but it started with Michi and heavily Far Eastern sounds engaged with exotic rhythms so right from the top the World-Music Festival really was traveling the world.  DD mixes any sound sources she can find and she loves to meld Eastern influences with synthy tech and a large part of the genius of the performers for shows like this is in taking disparate musical sounds to bring them together for music we have never heard before.

Psiquence continued with that in a manner more reminding of krautrock and Tangerine Dream.  This was one of stop of many in a tour around the world in whatever manner these creative wizards may bring it.


The picture was after getting daring and trying a long shot of Psiquence with his lovely assistants on-stage.  This went nowhere near catching the extraordinary light show Cat was driving and which she only got set up this morning.  That was the final candle for the show and after that it was ready so she might sleep a wee bit before the first performance.

After playing hundreds of shows in Second Life, I can tell you there's not so much pressure in performing for one but there's tremendous pressure in staging them.  That's not to minimize any pressure in performance since I suspect with the performers tonight every performance has to be the best the ever did.  There's just a wee bit of pressure in that too.


Donn Devore was a substitution after a show emergency situation (i.e. schedule and not at all human illness or injury) and this made a brilliant change, in part because I have never heard him previously playing in an electronic manner.  Again the Festival went out into sweeping imagination as he took us into exotic rhythms and vibes as he panned through the world.

In my experience, Donn played an acoustic set but I'm not so much partial to acoustic for reasons we don't need here.  That experience didn't tell me so much of his love of experimentation since he pursues multiple styles over time and acoustic was only one of them.  He said in coming back to electronic it's the full circle for him and it fits well.  After three previously in the day, Donn Devore played an exceptionally imaginative show and this kept the world simpatico alive at the most fascinating and vivacious levels throughout the day.


Here is Cat Boucher who by this time knows the Festival is really going to work and there are so many reasons to think before it starts that something won't work.  Sometimes when you reach for the stars, you find them ... but only when you reach.



The lady to the right may be Sam but I'm not sure since I was surrounded by beautiful women most of the time.  I tried moving sometimes but that only meant different beautiful women so I finally decided, stay put; moving makes no difference and you see this view is preferred.


DJ Fredja came up for the final of today's World-Music Festival performances and she brought pre-recorded music from just about everywhere.  By that time, I had only one destination in mind and that was the sofa to which I went the moment I logged out of the world and didn't awaken for about six hours.


Cat really outdid herself with this one as did all of the performers and there is one more day of the World-Music Festival coming up tomorrow.  Cat worked so hard on selecting just the right performers so there would be something of a global symmetry and simpatico between all of them and this is were she so supremely excelled.  No need to review those who do not do that since this is what happens when you do.

It wasn't so much a Festival of Stars but rather a festival of talent and these artists brought such wonderful things to it.  More to come tomorrow from performers who will take it in yet more directions with fado, flamenco, world jazz, and yet more beyond that.

This entire show has really been exceptional.

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