Camvention 2016 (UK) - Review
Saturday the 1st October 2016 saw the welcome return of Camvention, the Cambridge Juggling Convention, here follows my account of the day.
We enjoyed a hassle free drive from Leicestershire to the Cambridge University Sports Centre. I counted green cars (3) and Jenni counted blue cars (a gazillion) on the way there, after much hilarity and clarification of the rules. We actually arrived early and wandered into the hall at about 9.30AM. The Reg desk was set up and eager to take our monies and there were plenty of other people already juggling in the hall.
The hall at Cambridge is very spacious and pretty well-lit as well as being impossibly high, my perfect venue for a juggling convention. I like it very much.
The passes were wooden clothes pegs which were engraved with the Camvention logo, very collectable. We dropped off some Chocfest and Leeds Juggling Convention (19th November 2016, be there!) flyers and checked out the raffle prizes.
Now then… raffle prizes.
I was distraught to find that the Camvention organising team thought it would be acceptable to raffle a pineapple! The very nerve! As everyone knows a pineapple is traditionally always a part of the Leeds Juggling Convention (19th November 2016!) raffle! It is a slippery slope, pretty soon I think Camvention will also be providing free tea, coffee and doughnuts!!! I made clear to various members of the organisation how disappointed I was and received a number of rather weak excuses for the inclusion of the offending fruit. I was assured it was a genuine mistake so I left it at that. ;-)
We got ourselves nicely set up near Oddballs and spotted Lazy Juggler setting up the gaming area on the other side of the hall. Both seemed to be pretty busy during the day. I started a rapid club juggling warm up with the intention of hitting some 5 club tricks and numbers stuff. Broke off at various intervals to chat to folks as they arrived. I ended up having some great unplanned 10 club passing sessions with Becky, Cameron and Brook. Me and Brook also spent some time on 11 club ultimates and managed some clean flashes and ~18 throws to a collect. This felt better than when we tried at Coastcon, Jason even appeared out of nowhere and complimented us on the pattern. Didn’t get chance to pass with Jason in the end which I would have liked to have done.
I grabbed a spot of lunch and then hurried off to Mark and Dave’s bounce juggling and passing workshop. The workshop was split for those just learning to bounce and those after the tricks and wanting to try passing. I was taught the really nice zig-zag (don’t know how else to describe it…) bounce pattern with 4 and 5 balls, I will devote some time to that one as it looks lovely! The workshop was cut short about 10mins from the end due to health and safety concerns from the sports centre staff (the workshop was held in the corridor). Bit of a shame as I didn’t get a chance to do much passing.
Pre-published workshop timetable and print outs available on the day, great idea!
Coming back into the hall I found Jenni doing her best kidnap little baby Kiera. It was lovely to finally meet her and have a bit of a natter with Sam and Martin.
The games happened around this time. All the usual convention games were held and lots of people watched and participated. The sound system was rubbish and stopped working so that games master had to resort to shouting. It makes it so much more difficult to run the games without a working microphone although a substitute was eventually found. I managed to win 5 ring endurance and me and Greeny jointly won the 3 ball limbo. I dropped early on in the 5 ball endurance. I was told afterwards that I won 5 club endurance although I didn’t realise it at the time, I thought I saw someone else drop after me but apparently they had dropped and restarted..? I don’t know, I didn’t follow what happened there. I laughed very hard at Jenni and Twinkle doing the piggyback 3 ball gladiators.
Afterwards the club gladiators tournament was held. I lost two matches during qualification (Greeny and Brook). I played Greeny again during the semi-finals and managed to beat him to secure my place in the final against Brook.
Me and Jenni went out to the thai food van which had appeared outside the venue and sat and ate with Karen, Greg, Rob and Kat. I got to indulge and be a total greedy pig by finishing mine, Jenni’s and Kat’s various curries. Delicious! We were joined by Joanne, Cookie and Marek and one of the Ians. I put my foot in it by incorrectly congratulating Ian on an amusing joke he had previously made when in fact it must have been a different Ian.
I had a bit of a day of getting people mixed up / not recognising people... I nearly complimented Charlie on his book ‘Strange Feats and Clever Turns’ during the combat qualifications but the moment never seemed right. Turns out that was a good thing as I had got Charlie Holland and Charlie Hull mixed up completely… The other one was during the afternoon I spotted someone sitting at the side of the hall on the other side of the room who looked uncannily like Manuel Mitasch. Obviously my mistake so I was confused when I looked up during the games and there he was knee hooping whilst juggling 8 rings wearing a shirt which had ‘Manuel’ printed on the back… ah. I was too scared to ask him if he wanted to pass, I will probably regret that for some time.
The Camvention Show
A quarter of the hall is curtained off and racked seating emerges to form the Camvention show venue. Stage lighting and a sound desk appear and it works really well. I think everyone has a full view of the entire stage except perhaps some of the people on benches at the front. The benches were a late addition when it became obvious that there were not enough seats for everyone on the tiered seating.
The final match of the combat tournament was played as the opener of the Camvention show. I thought it worked well and the audience seemed to enjoy it. I wonder what other people thought of this format. I played really well and managed to beat Brook who I don’t think played his best, I was relieved that it worked out for me on the day. First prize was a huge wooden clothes peg with Camvention printed on it! Awesome! I will get a nice prize lined up for the Leeds (19th November 2016!) combat tournament.
Maarten Wils compered the show. He was entertaining and confident on stage although I do prefer a compere who doesn’t swear quite so much, it is a family show after all. Also, points were lost for forgetting the names of the acts although there was a last minute schedule change.
Elina opening the show with a stunning hoop routine. Opening the routine by walking on stage on your hands whilst spinning the hoop on one foot set the standard pretty high, but it was maintained throughout! Brilliant mix of gymnastic and hooping which was tightly choreographed to the music. Lots of smiles and audience interaction and a really good bow at the end. Definitely one of the best routines I have seen for a long long time!
Ieuan performed his ring juggling routine from the Open stage at this year’s BJC. It’s lovely to see ring juggling performed and Ieuan seemed really composed, lots of good movement and use of the stage.
The next act was the super top secret and eagerly awaited (at least by me) Cambridge Passing Collective. What a fantastic passing act! Super energetic and incredibly ambitious! It was a little droppy but it was nice to see that it was so well rehearsed. Everyone knew exactly what to do and it looked like every possible dropping scenario had been accounted for and planned for. I especially enjoyed the midway through the act ‘stage setting’ which was very funny and well thought out. I would suggest (for future performances) waiting for the laughter or applause to fully stop before shouting the next command/stage direction as some of them were lost in the noise. Difficult one to judge from a performance point of view. Seriously good work, I especially appreciated all of the bows at the end, very well done! Please can we see it on a BJC stage?
Interval time followed by the raffle. Quick note, you can seriously speed up a raffle by selling two set of tickets with the same numbers! ;-) I didn’t see who won the pineapple but it wasn’t me because Katie dropped (good run though!). I also did some recruiting for the Leicester juggling club.
The second half opened with David Stone who performed with contact balls. Unfortunately he had a few technical problems with his music (!) but he definitely strutted his stuff. Nice act.
Fred showed us some beautiful club juggling whilst Ben played live acoustic guitar accompaniment. It was lovely to watch and listen to although we found ourselves wanting Fred to drop so we could see what Ben did next! Nice audience interaction and more lovely bows. Bens chair was also really squeaky which I found very amusing!
Next there was an acrobalance routine with a very gymnastic edge to it performed by Lili and Kenny. It was a wonderful routine but there was a heart stopping moment with a catch gone wrong which resulted in a nasty looking belly flop/face plant. She was obviously shaken but they completed the routine in full and didn’t lose their stride, whilst remaining composed. I was really impressed and felt bad for them, but it was a great routine!
The finale act was performed by Guillaume Karpowicz. It was superb! I have tried writing a description of his act a few times and none of them do it justice. Very funny, very skilful, entirely entertaining and then he did 4 diablos at the end. What more do you want!
The final bow started off looking really rehearsed and professional but quickly turned into a bit of a shambles. I view the final bow as a very important part of the show which should be rehearsed, it just finishes the whole thing off nicely as well as looking really professional (when done well).
With the show over we gave bags of Peat HQ fruit to Sam and Martin before gathering Ben and Fred and giving them a lift to the station. We then bombed back to Leicestershire whist singing along to 90s pop songs. A great finish to a great day.
Thank you for such a great convention, we had an absolute blast! I would like to stay down next year and come to the extra bonus juggling day on the Sunday to make a full weekend of it. Really looking forward to coming back again next year, same venue and thai food wagon please!
Cheers, Jon
(Sorry, yet another long review, I hope you enjoyed it. If you did or didn’t then join the discussion. If you attended the event add your own review of the day too!)
#Camvention2016
Thanks for the review. I wanted to come, but was not keen on the three-hour each way drive. As it turned out, I sprained my back on Saturrday morning anyway. Maybe next year...
York Jugglers - - Parent #
To clarify, whilst Leeds Juggling Convention is on 19th November 2016, Chocfest is a separate convention and not till 28th January 2017 #Chocfest22.
Thank you for dropping off the Chocfest flyers Jon.
(I wonder which convention Leeds Juggling Convention copied the idea of free tea and coffee from?)
mike.armstrong - - Parent #
Hmm
Leeds started offering free tea and coffee (with our first doughnuts) in 1999 (I know, cos it was my idea!)
In those days Chocfest was still at the university and, while dishing out plenty of chocolate, they weren't so generous with the beverages...
#justsaying
York Jugglers - - Parent #
You are correct, Chocfest didn't start doing free tea and coffee till ~2004, so perhaps Chocfest was copying Leeds Juggling Convention (though there does appear to be a short hiatus in Leeds Conventions in the early 2000s).
#mike.armstrongknowshishistory
Little Paul - - Parent #
BASIL!!!
Little Paul - - Parent #
I've still got the tshirt somewhere
If you do still have one, I'd love to see a photo. I have a vague idea of what the design was that year.
York Jugglers - - Parent #
Photo of a slightly faded Basil t-shirt:
https://sites.google.com/site/yjimages/jpgs/Leeds_Juggling_Convention_Tshirt_1999_Basil.JPG
Little Paul - - Parent #
That's in better nick than mine, I guess I wore mine more!
Brook Roberts - - Parent #
Thanks for the lovely review! From my point of view the day went very well - all the organising in advance meant I could enjoy the convention, go to an acro workshop, do some good passing (see above!) and play in the combat tournament. Everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, and it was good to see reasonably sized hooping and acro communities there - it's a bit harder to organise for groups that I'm not a part of, but I felt we had critical mass for them to have their own areas and communities.
Really pleased with how the show went down, and with all the performers - especially those who made routines especially for Camvention. I really quite nervous about organising a show next year that isn't a let down after that (especially since I used up a tonne of Cambridge jugglers for this!).
Our passing routine seemed to get a good reception, which was nice, especially nice to talk to some of the professional performers about it and performing in general. I learnt a lot of things trying to put this together - lots of things to think about in choreographed passing routines that don't exist in other routines (like, as Jon mentioned, having to rehearse what to do in all sorts of drop scenarios). It was a bit droppier than we would have liked, but I think I was the only person in the group with experience performing in such an event - there was definitely some nerves, and a few of them said it was the first "real" show they've performed in. That's not really true, but it was a big, paying audience, and I think having stage lights and a tech run made an impact. Just means it'll go better next time, right? ;)
And I was really glad we booked Guillaume. When I initially talked to him, I had been hoping for a tech-y routine, and he offered a 1 diabolo routine, and whilst I thought it would probably be good and go down well, these things don't always come across the same on video, and I was worried it would be small (that's why we finished the first half with the passing, rather than going before him). It wasn't - it was so engaging and creative and amazing and yeah, you should see it :)
I'm already kind of looking forward to the next one!
Brook Roberts - - Parent #
That shouldn't come across as saying I didn't make any mistakes :P I didn't feel so nervous, but that just meant I didn't have an excuse for some of my bad passes :S
Brook Roberts - - Parent #
Oh, to actually reply:
You should have asked him, he's friendly, and you're good enough to do good stuff with him.
Yes, I would have prefered less swearing.
Don't rest on your laurels - you've had a pineapple monopoly for too long and I think some competition will really get you to up your pineapple game.
Yes, the talking was a bit quiet, but it's hard to rehearse that. I also thought Katie did a really good job, by saying something to get it started and to get the crowd to quieten down, and then repeat it so people good here. Until I watched a video, and realised the audience was still too loud. It's hard to judge on stage! We'll get better.
We did rehearse the bow :( My side did what we were supposed to :P
KStruthers - - Parent #
Thank you for the excellent and detailed review Jon. :)
Great review, Jon. You're not the first to mix up two Charlies, back in the day I'd get the odd email telling me a sofa was going to be delivered as someone had confused our email addresses...anyway, to save confusion, I'm the shorter one who wasn't involved in starting Circus Space and doesn't have an amazing collection of old juggling props!
Yes, quite. By the way, have you got any more copies of 4000 Years left for sale?
Fantastic review Jon, thank you. Really sorry I missed this year's Camvention, I have really enjoyed the past few years.
Could we also please have your treatise on what makes a good bow, why it is important, what are the pitfalls to avoid (bowing after the audience has finished clapping, awkward!) & perhaps some examples of some really good bows.
lukeburrage - - Parent #
I could do a long rant on this topic! Just a few things for now:
During the last act of the show, the rest of the acts should be lined up in the correct order on one side of stage.
The host should thank all the organizers/technicians before the acts come out on stage. This reduces the time the artists are standing around, not knowing how to respond.
The acts should be waiting the closest they can possibly to the stage, but not on the stage, waiting for their name to be called. Not at the bottom of the steps, but the top step. Not backstage somewhere, but right next to the edge of the curtain.
A stage manager should push the acts onto the stage.
The acts should get to the very front middle of the stage AS FUCKING QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE and take a big bow, then get out the way.
The host of the show has to be in charge. When they bow, everyone should follow them, and not do their own thing. They should be in the middle of the row of artists, not at the end, to more easily guide everyone in bowing or not bowing.
All of the acts should leave the stage on the same side. Why?
If there is going to be another curtain call, the host makes that call, and leads everyone back on stage again.
The stage manager should make sure all the acts stay close to the stage in case of another curtain call. Don't let the acts get distracted or head off to dressing rooms.
Everyone should be off the stage before the last person in the audience has stopped clapping.
How many of these didn't happen at Cambridge?
lukeburrage - - Parent #
Well yeah, all of this would be covered in a rehearsal.
Brook Roberts - - Parent #
It was rehearsed.
"The host should thank all the organizers/technicians before the acts come out on stage. This reduces the time the artists are standing around, not knowing how to respond." - probably the key relevant point here, if you've been on stage a while, and the acts know they at some point in the proceedings are supposed to leave the stage, there is always a risk they think it's time to leave. Most of everything else you said occurred - I think in general reducing the time in which things can go wrong is always a plus.
I will not cover the ‘final bow’ as I think Luke has covered it very well. Definitely reduce the amount of time where all the acts are stood in a line looking awkward and good point about the show host being in the centre of the line to guide the performers.
These are my subjective opinions on which I rate the performers ‘end of routine’ bow. Disclaimer, I am not a professional performer and have received no formal training, this is just what I think works through years of watching shows.
Important points which should always be considered when creating a routine:
*Does the bow match my performance style?
*Does the bow match my stage character?
I have seen too many sultry burlesque-esque style routines where as soon as the music stops the femme fatale character becomes very coy and scurries off stage. I much prefer acts where the performer remains in character during their end of routine bow and exit from the stage.
I have also seen too many acts where the performer has obviously been told that they should bow at the end of the routine and so they give it a half-hearted go before running off stage, without a backward glance, as fast as they can. It is scary on stage, bowing feels awkward and silly. Nevertheless, unless you have a character who does not need to bow or exits the stage before a bow is necessary then it has got to be done.
It is the moment when the performer thanks and acknowledges the audience.
The final bows of the show I am not too fussed about whether the performer remains in character although I will relate an example where I feel the performer missed a great opportunity.
The convention show at Crawley about 5 (maybe more) years ago had a fantastic whip cracking act. I am not that into whip cracking but this routine was superb and the audience went nuts for it, myself included. The character was a ‘librarian’ type character who performed to Bjork ‘Oh, it’s so quiet’. He entered the stage reading a book and proceeded to ‘hush’ the audience by holding a finger to the lips at the correct moments. (Hear the song: https://youtu.be/2UjvaOusjNg) When the music reached a crescendo the whips would come out and the performer would go crazy and let rip with the whips. When the time came for the final bow and the performer was called again onto the stage he ran forward took a very nice bow and entered the line with everyone else.
It worked.
BUT, I would have given a standing ovation if he had come out on stage again with his head buried in the book, been disturbed by the noise the audience had made and then shushed the audience.
That would have been PERFECT.
I think the point I want to make is this:
The first time you bow should never be in front of an audience.
Little Paul - - Parent #
I'll take a bow-out-of-character over what a lot of acts did in BYJOTY 2 years ago - all the circomedia/circus space students finished their routine, turned and ran off the back of the stage not pausing to take their applause or bow at all, the non circus school acts took a bow, even if it was a little awkward.
I think someone near me remarked at the time "taking your applause must be on the summer term syllabus"
The whip cracker you are thinking of is Simon Ratzker (I thought it was Björk too, but turns out it was Betty Hutton!).
Yep, I think a performer should remain in character for the entirety of their stage time. I loved Eugenius Nil's awkward interaction with Loz Becoz when she offered him a hug after his act & he shyly ran away at BJC 2013.
Keep up with your reviews Jon. I rarely comment on them, but always [thus far at least] enjoy reading them.
As ever, Jon remains one of the best convention reviewers.
However we may need someone else to step forward for Leeds, Jon is show organiser. I am uncertain of the correct etiquette for reviewing your own show (Luke probably knows) but feel that others ought to comment on how brilliant it was(will be) to save any possible accusations of conflict of interests, something we take very seriously in Leeds.
See you all there.
Alice
Mike Moore - - Parent #
I always enjoy these reviews. Thank you for writing them.
Thank you all for reading and reviewing my review!
I also like to read convention reviews and HLGCS so please do write something about a convention if you have been to one.
I will soon be reporting from Durham Juggling Convention (14th - 16th October, https://www.jugglingedge.com/event.php?EventID=4330) and I look forward to seeing you there! :-)
Cheers, Jon
Mike Moore - - Parent #
Haha, I'm afraid I'm on the wrong side of the Atlantic for that one.
I like reading HLGCBSs so much that attendees at the fest I run get up to $10 off admissions based on their HLGCBSs. Here's how it works:
Starting price: $10
Are you new this year? If so, subtract $5
Did you post an HLGCBS last year? If so, subtract $5.
Will you post an HLGCBS this year? If so, subtract $5.
That resulted in these three threads from this year:
https://jugglingedge.com/forum.php?ThreadID=2701&SmallID=20246#Small20246
https://jugglingedge.com/forum.php?ThreadID=2703&SmallID=20265#Small20265
https://jugglingedge.com/forum.php?ThreadID=2702&SmallID=20248#Small20248
Somewhat predictably, encouraging people who normally don't write HLGCBSs to do so leads to a few broken threads, as they're not used to the posting system. Still very happy they did it!
Mike Moore - - Parent #
Yep! Enough people don't write them that they cover my shoestring budget. We get the space for free, and least year someone even donated free pizza to everyone at the fest (~40 people).
For the last two years, attendees have been very enthusiastic about going for sushi on the Saturday night. This year I am thinking about trying to get a group discount, and apply the money saved through that discount to fest budget. I like that better than charging at the door because I don't like the idea of financial barriers to going to (especially small) fests.
Mike Moore - - Parent #
We have also always been able to house all every person who asked for it with local jugglers. Woohoo for a healthy juggling club and a small fest!