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Tuesday Tease: Vermont Burlesque Festival

Champ.LogoMan, burlesque festivals are just popping up EVERYWHERE! This weekend marks the inaugural Vermont Burlesque Festival happening in South Burlington. I met the festival’s organizer Cory Royer in Los Angeles when we were down there in early December and he told me then that he’s got a great weekend of entertainment planned. Now, I can see what he meant. He’s got a bunch of fun in store for the Northeast. We’re talking three days and two nights of burlesque, comedy and variety acts: shows, classes, a film festival and BOWLING! How can you go wrong?

While the lion’s share of performers hail from Vermont, there will also be some national performers showing up; namely the lovely Lili Von Schtupp from LA, Cha Cha Velour from Vegas, the Boston Babydolls, Chicago’s boylesque sensation and member of the Stage Door Johnnies: Ray Gunn and Montreal’s Scarlett James.

While chatting on the phone with Cory today, he told me: “I am excited to be working with so many talented local, national and international people who are helping to create Vermont’s first burlesque festival.”

Judging by the schedule, I can see why he’s excited. Things kick off this Friday with the opening ceremonies and Friday night’s showcase at 5 Market Street. Immediately after the showcase will be the “Burlesque Bounce” dance party featuring DJ Irie. Saturday will bring a burlesque brunch, classes, another showcase and the Burlesque Bowling Competition at Shelburne’s Champlain Lanes. Festival attendees will have the whole bowling alley to themselves and are encouraged to dress their team in a theme and compete for the best theme, best costumes, most team shimmies, most outrageous performance in sport, worst dressed team and more. Somehow a bunch of burlesque beauties in a bowling alley sounds like trouble to me.

Sunday is reserved for recovery from the previous two days of pandemonium and a burlesque film festival. A perfect way to wind down and nurse your hangover!

It’s so exciting that burlesque festivals are no longer in major metropolitan areas but in smaller cities like South Burlington. When you see an artistic movement like burlesque spread to far reaches of the country (and world) it goes to show that it isn’t going anywhere. And aren’t we lucky to be ticketing so many of these great festivals?

If you’re in the Vermont area, I can’t recommend the Vermont Burlesque Festival enough. I think it’s safe to say that the Northeast is about to get a little heat wave this winter. Get your tickets here!

Love burlesque festivals? Check out some other great ones that we’re ticketing:
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Tuesday Tease: Our Guide to Burlycon 2013!

WEB-burlycon2013That’s right! Get excited! Burlycon, the only “community-oriented professional growth and educational convention for Burlesque performers, fans, and aficionados” is returning to Seattle’s Doubletree Inn this Thursday, November 7 to Sunday, November 10.

Burlycon is not your standard burlesque convention in that it has no public showcases or burlesque shows. Burlycon is produced by the burlesque community, for the burlesque community. It’s where you go to get your routines peer-reviewed by some of the top talents in the burlesque world, to learn some new moves that’ll spice up your act or tips on how to beef up your stage costumes. It’s also where you go to learn how to properly manage your finances as a burlesque performer, how to use online marketing to promote your shows and tips on how to get booked.

I’ll also be in the house, teaching a class on Saturday, November 9 at 5:15pm in Cascade 13 on how to most effectively ticket your burlesque event using Brown Paper Tickets or similar ticketing platforms. Also, Brown Paper Tickets will be hosting a delicious Mediterranean dinner courtesy of Mr. Gyros on Friday, November 8 from 6pm to 8pm in the Hospitality Suite, as well as handing out some neato gift bags. If you’re headed to Burlycon this year, I hope you’ll attend either of these events and come up and say hi. I love meeting burly friends from around the country and Burlycon often feels like one big family reunion!

There’s also tons to do besides learn. Thursday night will be the Birds of a Feather Caucuses in Cascade 10-13. This is your chance to mingle, network, and chat with others in your community whoburlycon2009_donspiro_02 share common backgrounds. Attendees are encouraged to attend the caucuses you identify with based on your region, your relationship status (single, married, parents or poly), your community (performers of size, LGBTQI, performers with disabilities or performers of color) or you hobbies. The caucuses will be followed by a meet and greet social in the Hospitality Suite so you can start connecting with new and old friends and get your weekend started out right!
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Tuesday Tease: The Michigan & New Orleans Burlesque Festivals!

fancy-pants-mi-burl-fest-13-flier‘Tis the season for burlesque festivals and we got two great ones coming up this weekend!

The lovely state of Michigan will get its first burlesque festival this Saturday in Detroit and we got to chat with the organizers Valencia Starling and Mabel Syrup.

Also, the legendary New Orleans Burlesque Festival kicks off its fifth year on Thursday and we are proud to announce that Brown Paper Tickets is ticketing their workshops! We are so excited to be a part of this legendary festival and we’ll highlight some of our picks for workshops, for those of you heading down to the Big Easy this weekend.

But, first things first: Michigan’s getting its own burlesque festival! This Saturday, September 21, the First Annual Michigan Burlesque Festival will take place at the Hasting Street Ballroom and Tangent Gallery in Detroit. A wide variety of burlesque entertainment will grace the stage on Saturday including: acrobatics, trapeze, silks, chains, hula hooping, traditional striptease, vocal numbers, veil fan dancing, bawdy comedy and more.

The main event will take place in the Ballroom and headliners for the evening include The Weird Sisters Circus aerial troupe, Cleveland’s burlesque queen Bella Sin, and Detroit’s very own Lushes LaMoan. The host for the evening will be the delectable and vibrant Foxy Tann and DJ Shane Bang will be providing audible pleasures. In addition to the star-studded line-up, the Tangent Gallery will be booming throughout the night, lined with artists and merchants displaying and selling their crafts, apparel, sweet treats and more! You can pick up tickets right over here. We recommend getting them now as they’re going fast!

Valencia and Mabel from Fancy Pants Arts and Entertainment were kind enough to take time off from the pre-festival craziness to talk a little about the festival and the burlesque scene in Michigan. Here’s what they had to say:
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