Threads tagged #cjc2

JonPeat - 2016-05-16 14:57:12 UTC #

Cumbria Convention 2016 – Review (UK)

Yesterday was the 2nd Cumbria Juggling Convention held in Appleby in Westmorland.
Here follows my review of the convention and meanderings of the weekend in general.

We gathered Ed from the station and grabbed a spot of food at home before bombing it up the A1 to Appleby on the Friday night. Last year I took a more scenic route to avoid the traffic. Turns out that on this stretch traffic was not a problem and in fact it was far more scenic than going the pretty way! Shaved 40mins off the journey. Ed was particularly taken with the fine views and scenery on the way across the country on the A66.

We had time for a mini car tour of Appleby before heading over to our B&B and having a very good game of scrabble. Our host was quite surprised and refreshed when we said we wouldn’t need the password for the WiFi!

The following morning we tanked up with a great big full English breakfast before heading over to venue.
The convention is held at the local sports centre in the large main hall. No water coolers, lost points there, although there was a small cafe which sold essentials.

The convention started with a bit of awkwardness as half the hall was being used for a karate class and so there was a lot of awkward silence in-dispersed with various death shouts from the karate group. We filled this time warming up with a hand/ball hackey sack game with some of the Yorkies which was really good fun.

The warriors left at around 11am, the curtain was drawn back and we all spread out and filled the hall.
Me and Ed did lots of passing, I spent more money at Lazy juggler and even bought some nice new numbers balls from Butterfingers. I liked Ron’s sales pitch to me which consisted of walking past and saying ‘that’s a good game!’, I was looking at Hive at the time. I don’t need much more than that from Ron as he knows his stuff so I bought it.

I stopped every now and then to watch Emil Dahl practising in the hall. I particularly liked 6 rings with a ring head balance, 8/9 rings and some really lovely hand balancing tricks (rings balancing on hands). Super hard and super smooth (more seen during the show).
I avoided watching Masa practising in the hall as I wanted his show to be a surprise, more about Masa later!

The hall never got full. In fact it felt very empty this year. I was surprised that after the success of last year the numbers didn’t shoot up this year. I can only think that everyone must have been busy watching the Eurovision? The hall needed some music to be played to liven it up a bit at times as it did feel a bit quiet.

It was a nice sunny day outside so we had our lunch in the sun until we realised the wind was actually quite cold and strong, so we bailed out and ate in the hall in the end.

Me and Ed then started playing with some of the ball poi which had been abandoned by the BMP crowd. It was way harder than I thought it would be… There are timing issues as well as judging the throws and adding in the swings on the down stroke. We both really enjoyed it and spent quite a while messing around, also tried a 5 ultimate’s pattern with mixed success. I got 20 odd catches solo but it required some serious attention to keep the pattern going!

Games time! The games were well attended. Me and Ed tried our hand at the long distance passing but were short about 10 foot, I came 2nd in 5 prop endurance. Apart from that we didn’t pay much attention to the games this year as we were messing around with toy planes…
Combat tournament time! We struggled for numbers initially but eventually rustled up the 8 players required for the tournament. The first prize not only received 200 points but a rather fetching Golden Apple Trophy!! All conventions should offer a special combat tournament trophy as it fired everyone up! The tournament ran pretty smoothly except for unruly children playing in the danger area. I finally managed to win a tournament (no Brook!), Rob came second and Callum came in third place. Full results have been submitted and should be online soon.

After the tournament we gathered our things together, collected devil stick Matt, and we all piled into my car and went off into town in search of food. We ate in a nice Indian restaurant, same place as last year, and all the other tables were also jugglers from the convention which was really nice.
We were the last to finish and leave and we then walked through the town to the arts centre where the show was held last year. It was locked and no one around… looked in the window and the entire floor was up being refurbished!! Quick speed walk back to the car as well as quite a few phone calls (no signal in Appleby) resulting in us rushing back to the venue and finding hall the hall had been turned into the show venue. Completely missed that announcement of where the show was! Ooops.

Never mind, we were actually in plenty of time for the start of the show. This was another moment when we looked around the hall and were shocked by how few people there were… It didn’t matter as far as the show was concerned as Tiff was compere and managed to keep a great level of energy and enthusiasm going in the room.

First act was Masayuki Furuya performing his plate spinning performance which I hear he did at the EJC last year. Very cool plate spinning and juggling combinations, beautifully presented, I loved it!!! He was my perfect performer, excellent performing skills and audience engagement. Why are the Japanese such good performers, where does it come from!?! I grinned throughout the whole routine and especially loved the cheeky third plate!

BMP performed the routine which they did at the BJC this year, minus one performer from the troupe. It was very good again, I enjoyed it much more this time having spent the afternoon trying to juggle their poi and seeing how hard it is. I appreciated a lot of the tricks a lot more too.

Greeny performed his cabaret club juggling routine. I really enjoyed it as I like very techy 3 club stuff but I can see that it might not have been everyone’s cup of tea. I liked seeing his character coming through the techy stuff as well.

Claire performed her hula hoop routine which she performed in the Open stage at BJC this year. It’s a good routine but I desperately want to see more happy smiles and audience engagement.

Doris performed her Dracula esk unicycle routine. I love the routine but this is the first time where I have seen her miss some of the big tricks. Such a shame but nether the less an outstanding routine.

Emil Dahl was too good. He made everyone very upset by being too good. Amazingly hard ring balances and combinations done very smoothly and without any grandeur. I sat open mouthed for a lot of it, very inspiring. Again, I loved it!

I was sad to hear that Ameron was unable to make the convention and perform in the show due to illness, I hope he recovers soon.

The Cumbria show was excellent! It was a tall order to beat the show from last year but the very high standard was definitely maintained, well done Rosie!

Juggling was had in the hall again following the show so myself and Ed did more passing until we roped Kiran into doing some roundabout. I really enjoyed the roundabout once I realised I had been turning the wrong way and then corrected it. Funnily it ran much better once I stopped messing up my turns.

We said our goodbyes before returning to the B&B and playing Hive (Ron was right of course, it’s a great game!). Breakfast the following morning, another scenic drive across country where we saw castles and the Lloyd’s TSB horse. We played Catan before dropping Ed off at the station. Good weekend all round.

Roundup.
Cumbria Convention is a great one dayer which is well worth the journey! The show has been of consistently high standard, higher than the majority of other one day convention shows.
It was very poorly attended. I do not know if the convention made much money (although the raffle must have generated quite a lot) but I really hope it did. I am looking forward to attending again next year so please; come to Cumbria convention next year, I do not think that you will disappointed!

Thank you Rosie and your team for running another great Cumbria Convention!

Cheers, Jon

P.S I remembered the Hastag!

#CJC2 #conventionreview

rosiejane - 2016-04-24 15:39:36 UTC #

Hey you Guys, do you know about a great convention coming up real soon? So I am sharing the information that is posted in the Event Facebook Group by Rosie Kelly

https://www.facebook.com/events/990400857706210/permalink/1081049308641364/

It's back. Its BiGgEr. Its bad to the bone.

Cumbria Juggling Convention returns in all its horrific splendor, expect games, workshops, stalls, and another international star filled show.
It might have a few other tricks up its sleeve too....

Tickets:
Full Day and Show: £10
Under 10's: £5
Under 3's: FREE
International Jugglers: FREE
Students with valid card: DISCOUNT!

New Announcement! Theres free camping on the Saturday night after the CUMBRIA JUGGLING CONVENTION!!

very close to the site, all you need to do is let me (read Rosie Kelly) know before the convention if you want a space, as it could become limited!
( if enough people want a camping space we can organise more space! just need numbers)