So I have had a good summer of fire performance and it isn't over.
I had the chance to perform at Faerieworlds in June, and I have done a lot of work with friends. Upcoming I have Faerieworlds Harvest, which we are still deciding what to do, and the big one for me Earthdance Northwest.
EDNW is not bigger than FW nor is it better in any way, but this is the big one for me for several reasons.
1. I am using a character that has been under development for 6 months
2. It is the first festival gig I got without my friend's connections - I got this one on my own
3. I am doing it by myself. I am carpooling up there with strangers, and camping solo. Additionally, there will be way more people there than normal who I don't know (unlike FW where I can't go 20 feet without seeing someone I know)
I am really excited for it, and for everything coming in the near future.
I also had the chance recently to record some of my fire stuff, including my new character, who I will talk about in a bit.
I have videos for the character, fans, and poi. They were all improvised and done without any planning other than "I wanna spin fire tonight." The ones I still have left to film are contact juggling and eating (fire of course).
Anyway, as I am writing this, I am editing the videos for sound so they sound nice, but I am not doing any video editing whatsoever (ok, maybe a little bit) so hopefully by the time I post it, they will be ready to post links.
That was the plan. I still might go through with the plan because it is a good plan.
However, something kinda crazy happened last night. I was working on fire eating/breathing with my friend Braedon, who has been working so hard on all of this, and I am really proud of him. Having an apprentice is fun (we did a fans/breathing duet that I choreographed in like 30 minutes last week, I still remember it, and I hope to get it on film once I do some repair work on my equipment).
I got my lip burned last night. And my stomach. And my arm. Minor burns, just annoyances really - nothing more than I'm used to. They hurt a lot more than I am used to, but I blame that on the fact that I hadn't eaten anything in over 12 hours, so I just wasn't operating on full.
Anyway, I had a thought when I was nursing my burns with some ice: God I am tired of it.
I love fire eating and breathing because they are way cool, and they demonstrate a control that few have. And crowds love it. The reason I work so hard on them is because nobody else will do them. I don't like competition, and working in that field reduces it. I can't compete with the best when it comes to poi, I don't see fans and me becoming best friends and spending hours working together, and I sure as hell don't want to make a habit of doing fire contact juggling a lot. So it was my only option, but now I have this new thing that I do. Nobody does this. Seriously - I've been watching youtube videos of fire performance for years, and I have never seen something like this.
I want this to become my thing. This character will become more sleek, more well oiled, use more props, all in his own unique fashion (which will make sense when you see the video).
I am tired of nursing burns on my chest and arms. I am tired of shaving my arms and chest before every show. I am tired of burns inside my mouth that make me chew on my own lip for a week.
And now I finally have a way to not do that anymore.
So, here's the new plan. I am gonna rip out the best fire eating routine I have ever done in my life. I am gonna do it once. I am going to record it, and then I am gonna put it in the demo video. I want to show that I can, and unless SPECIFICALLY ASKED I will not perform it. Fire eating no longer has a place in the fire jams I go to. It is a purely professional art for me. And I mean that literally. If I am going to burn myself for your entertainment, I am going to get paid.
Alright, video time.
#3 Fire Poi: I did this to "The Voice" by Celtic Woman, which I have actually done before, and have a video of it (on my youtube, and you can see how much I have improved in that time). Anyway, I want to clarify that poi is just something I do for fun. I don't practice more than once a week, and this was completely improvised with next to no warm up. Translation: just for fun, not to be taken seriously as a representation of what I do - poi is just a hobby (but you can be sure the highlights are going in the demo). Oh, and also, I did this blindfolded - just so that is clear.
#2 Fire Fans: I need to explain the music. It is not what I would have chosen, but just before I did this, I gave my friend a challenge and had him use fans to Enya's "Oronico Flow" which, if you've ever heard it, does not lend itself to my style of fans (which is what I have been teaching him). I just wanted to see what he would do. Then I told him he could choose anything he wanted for my set, and he gave me "Cannibal" by Ke$ha, which I actually like as a song, but not my first choice. Anyway, the moment I knew what the music was is the start of the video - true improv this one was (except that I know that song really well)
#1 Fyrieth: So I finally came up with a name for this guy - Fyrieth (FEAR-ee-eth). It is a word taken from Old English, and is actually a third person conjugation of fyrian (Chronicles of Riddick anyone?) which translates to "to supply fire." So this guy's name roughly translates to "supplier of fire" in a very inexact way. I wanted him to be in complete control of fire without reaching into pockets for lighters or flasks - if I couldn't keep it (1) on my body and (2) hidden, I didn't do it. This was the result. Music is "August" by UNK Remix. Enjoy!
So, I have these three videos, and once I record my badass fire eating and contact juggling videos, I will mix them altogether into a fire demo for myself, should be pretty fun. Look for that entry in a week or so.
That's all the facts from the fire front for today, burn it up.
Today's blog has been sponsored by the letter F.
