THE CITY, THE NIGHT, PAINTING WITH FIRE: BUSKERFEST 2014

A young man does something breath taking on a pole

A woman does something unexpected inside a giant wheel

Another woman dances in the night, lithe and fluid, surrounded by fire, the flames painting the darkness in gold and red

It could all be magic and perhaps it is. This past weekend, Buskerfest returned to the streets of Toronto. For several years they held this event around St Lawrence Market but for the past couple of years it has been on and around the downtown Yonge St. strip. We went down in the evening. We like fire shows and fire shows are often best appreciated in the dark

The first fire show we saw still had light. They were called Flame Oz. Because they had flames. And they are from Australia.

They were pretty good. They were one of the larger groups that we saw so they were able to put a lot of variety in their show. Even so, they had a couple tricks that were popular with other acts as well. We declared this the summer of the floating glass balls. Not only did we seem them from two different acts at Buskerfest, we also saw them use at the CNE about which I will blog later

Another popular act was the burning hula hoop. I can only speculate how this came about. One day in Hawaii a girl was enjoying her hula hoop and got a bit too close to the volcano? A warning for us all. But at Buskerfest, it was an entertaining, sometime amusing, sometimes beautiful endeavor.

The latter pic is one part of the two part team Canadian busker team called Kamikaze Fireflies. What the woman is doing, in that pic, is twirling five burning hoops, apparently a world record. They were one of my favorite acts of the night. They were not strictly a fire act; they did whips, balancing and the Russian wheel. The girl happily pointed out that the Russian wheel is an apparatus generally considered too difficult for a woman to use. Yeh, hear her roar, bitch

Her male partner did his own feat of derring do, building and then balancing upon a stack of five wooden chairs. Whereas many street performers sometimes underplay the danger of their acts, the Kamikaze, name aside, let us know just how difficult their stunts were and gosh, they just may not succeed ... but of course they always did

They used a lot a comedy in their act, varying from vaudeville to burlesque. As you will see in the video, a lot of their patter was tongue in cheek risque. And speeking of cheeks, they had an interesting variation on the guy using a whip to break something being held by a girl

Flame Oz had a kind of Vegas feel about them and Kamikaze Firefly were vaudeville. The other fire act that we saw was more goth and drama. Nomad Cirquel is a duo that uses some of the same props as the other acts: The gloating globe, flaming hoops etc. But their act is enfused with music and a high, if not sometimes misplaced, sense of drama

The guy was adept with weapons, using a whip, also used by Flame Oz and the Fireflies, as well as an asian pike. The girl had her flaming hoop and was very good with it, she brought an acrobatic grace to the device that some of the other performers did not. Yes, she is a flame dancer who is truly hot.What I found truly striking about this act was their pas de deux, a duet with and without flaming batons that exhibited a high degree of athletic ability and a sensual sense of form and body

The night was not all fire shows however. Walking by an alley we heard a sinuous enticing sound and found Dr Draw, a Jean Luc Ponty-style violinist of whom we are quite fond

There was also Reuben DotDotDot the aforementioned young man who did something spectacular with his pole .. settle down, he's not that kind of busker

Buskerfest is a huge event, spanning several days and a lot of downtown acerage. It's impossible to see everything but that in a sense is a good thing. Coz as they say in show biz, always leave em wanting more.
Toronto Buskerfest 2014 from Victor Kellar on Vimeo.

BUSKERFEST 2010

Jugglers and tumblers and unicycles, oh my! This past weekend the St. Lawrence Market district of Toronto was taken over by face painted, colourfully dressed, flamboyant characters .. no, Pride Week has already happened this year. This was, of course, Buskerfest.

This year we went down to the festival not really knowing what to expect. It's a fun way to experience it. Wandering around the area that has been closed off to traffic, the acts spread out along many blocks, basically following the crowed and listening for applause or music or the patter of the performers. Sometimes that means you butt up against a ring of people so thick you have no chance of seeing over their heads and you pray for a "flying" act so you can get a glimpse of the performers as they soar up over the heads of the onlookers.

The first act we came upon was a charity case. Apparently these lovely birds had been abandoned in their cage. A sign stated "Please feed the birds" If you did, they danced and did some acrobatics on a swing and climbed up to perform on the top of their cage

Besides tumbler and caged birds Buskerfest would not be Buskerfest without jugglers. I am, pretty much, over jugglers. Seriously, with a few exceptions all the juggling acts tend to blur together. Almost all street jugglers use, or try to use, comedy to bolster their act. Some are good, but comedy is not a skill set shared by all. What often happens is you get this guy below, a pretty good juggler but a pretty lame comedian. His act consisted of 10 minutes of lame patter to get to 40 seconds of decent juggling

But for all the "been there seen that" jugglers at the fest you always find something fresh and original. Like this group of tumblers from the States. We got to their show a little late and I had a difficult time filming over the crowd (you will see one shot on the video below) but Collette is a good and insistent photographer so got a couple of shots

Now, the St Lawrence Market district in Toronto is an old neighbourhood, the market building itself goes back to around 1901. But the market doesn't seem the only thing held over from the ancient times, apparently dragons inhabited downtown Toronto back in the day and Buskerfest seems to have brought them back to life

Of course what these creatures were, are stilt walkers in remarkable articulated costumes complete with sound effects. They moved about gracefully with so many independent body parts I wondered how many hands the operators must have had.
Although you could say I'm all "tumbled out" the one thing I always like to see at Buskerfest are the ribbon gymnasts. And this year did not disappoint. There was lovely, traditional, elegant ribbon work as demonstrated by this young girl from the Circus School ...

.. or we saw a different take on the art, as performed by the remarkable clown Lulu. Her act involves "discovering" the ribbon rig and deciding to try her hand at it. In perfect clown fashion, Lulu grabs the ribbons and, clumsy creature that she is, tries to be as graceful and elegant as the other girls but of course it is beyond her limited skill set ... The real trick of course is that Lulu is a very skilled aerial artist and knows exactly what she's doing up there. As you'll see in the video, she is like the female Buster Keaton of the ribbons, playing this inept character with a ton of skill and dexterity that is not at first apparent.

It seems that every year at Buskerfest we come across one act that really stands out. Last year it was Dream State Circus a remarkable act from Australia featuring acrobatics, fire dancing and a graceful sexiness. This year it was couple from Japan, Gheeky and Daiki

Cheeky & Daiki seem as far away from Dream State Circus as you could get. The Australian couple are graceful and sensual. The Japanese couple are frantic and clumsy .. on the surface. Cheeky is much like Lulu: A gifted clown who hides her considerable physical skills under a zany surface of playful cheekiness. Yes, she is well named.

Cheeky was absolutely hilarious, playing off of Daiki's worried and embarrassed character. They are very much a Japanese Ricki and Lucy. Daiki, a skilled unicycle rider was trying to put on a trick show, whereas Cheeky was a mess, easily distracted and incredibly flirty. As you'll see on the video, she has a certain fondness for camera men.

As I mentioned, this was basically a unicycle stunt act and both performers were extremely skilled. But both are more than stunt people they are indeed performers. And I acknowledge the skill and art of the straight man, so Daiki is more than a guy who can do some amazing stuff on one wheel.

The couple had a lot of familiar elements in their show: Audience interaction, build ups to stunts, back and forth banter, but Cheeky is flat out hilarious, the show was lifted above the norm. I don't think I'd have been too entranced by a straight out unicycle stunt show but this pair of clowns were able to elevate it to a higher level of entertainment.

So all in all another successful Buskerfest. Collette and I were remembering our first fest, quite a few years ago. It was held at Nathan Phillip's square and I think there were a handful of performers over two days. It has grown. In Toronto that means thousands and thousands of people squeezed into limited space, most of them displaying extremely poor social skills but still .. A hot sunny Saturday, performers who work their asses off cuz if you don't like, you don't pay and a cold beer on a patio ...

What else would you want. Enjoy the video

Toronto Buskerfest 2010 from Collette Scale on Vimeo.

DREAM STATE CIRCUS: PLAYING WITH FIRE

This is my second post chronicling our visit to Buskerfest here in Toronto. I wanted to do a separate post focusing on our favorite act of the festival, and one of the best acts we've seen at any of the Buskerfests.

Jason and Sophie McGrath are a married couple from Austrlia. They are not jugglers, thank god. But they do play with fire in a remarkable, entrancing, sensual way; individually and together, just as most couples do things. In my previous post about the Buskerfest I bemoaned the fact that too many of the acts, particularly the jugglers, used patter to cover up the fact that their acts were not particularly original. No fear of that here. This couple has patter, but it's quite cute, the kind of He says something outrageous She says "Jason!" in a way most couples would recognize. But trust me, Dream State Circus is about a lot more than just patter.

They started off the show with some warm ups. Not only are these two a pretty pair, they have some pretty impressive athletic gifts. Including a bit where Jason lifts Sophie up over his head and holds her there for 20 seconds. I don't think Sophie cracks 100 pounds, mind you, but it's still pretty impressive.

After the warm ups, each member of the couple did an individual fire dance. Sophie begins, using a pair of chains with a ball of fire on the end of each one. I love her focus, the mental connection to the physical, as she readied herself for her performance, you could see her body change, marshaling her energy in preparation

From this sort of Zen like state, Sophie quickly exploded into a whirlwind of beautifully controlled energy, her body moving to the music, the fire flipping around her, creating entrancing patterns in the air.

Fire is heat and heat is often associated with sensuality and if you ever had any doubt about that, watch the video at the bottom of this post.

After Sophie's first performance, it was Jason's turn. He used a pair of long batons, ablaze on each end, whirling them around with a casual grace that made it look way too easy.

At one point, during Sophie's performance, Jason joined her, and demonstrated that he may have skin made out of asbestos, as he ran the fire up his bare arms

After Jason's solo, Sophie came back out and used a hula hoop in a very original manner.

It wasn't just that the hoop was on fire, it was Sophie's remarkable body control, easily flipping the hoop from feet, to torso, to around her neck

After this dance, the couple teamed up and each used a pair of flaming flaming brands in a high energy dance.

At the end of this dance, Jacob proved he is a real Australian by bringing out his bullwhip. Of course, this is no normal whip. It's made out of Kevlar, so he can set it on fire.

He set the whip on fire and popped it, sending these big fireballs into the air. In the video, you can hear the loud crack as the whip breaks the sound barrier.

After the whip display, Jason and Sophie went into their final routine. Setting up a ring of fire, the pair went through a series of acrobatic poses that were quite breathtaking.

As is traditional in these kinds of displays, it was a lot of Jason holding and posing Sophie. They looked beautiful. Clean lines, steadiness, perfect balance. But there was also a move where Sophie was supporting Jason in an impressive display of feminine strength.

What makes this fire dancing so sexy? I mean, beyond the two beautiful people? Is it the lambent reflection of the fire rippling over the exposed, sweating flesh? Is it the heat that you feel on your own skin as the torches pass by you, the smell of the gasoline, the sound of the fire itself? Is it the concentration of the performers, when you see them caught up in the moment, losing themselves in the music and the movement and the energy of the crowd.

Whatever it is, it works. And Dream State Circus certainly works.

The video below is a long one, but I wanted to capture the entire performance. As the sky got darker, of course, the effect of the fire became more dramatic. Dream State also performed as part of Buskerfest's closing gala; we attended that as well and I shot some video, it may make an appearance in a future post, but enjoy what was, for Collette and I, the performance of the festival.

Dream State Circus from Victor Kellar on Vimeo.