This Really is The Blue Theatre Song Contest Review

Dear Free-Folk,

Ten bands gathered last Saturday, eight of these had prepared a song and performance to present to the audience.

The Ninny Hammers opened the event with their song Budapest. The message of this song: All the songs are special, precious and fun to share. I really wanted to host an event that celebrated all the different methods of arranging music, the tough task for band leaders would be selecting one to highlight for one particular evening.

We soon got through the opening speech and into the important part of the evening, listening to the bands play!

Here is my personal opinion about each entry.

Les Chantefables:

With leader Louellana at the helm Les Chantefables took their positions on the stage to perform. With music by Thomas Bergersen they performed a special Eleven adaptation of “Rhapsody”. The performance was excellent, the tale was enchanting. With a compliment of eleven free-folk the arrangement was intricate and well executed. I loved in particular the strumming of the Misty Mountains Harp. The song lasted 4m 56s a good use of their alloted time. This was a knockout overture in the Blue Theatre.

I have one observation to make about this song, this is an observation and not a critique. During the song I found my mind wandered away from listening to the arrangement, it has a hypnotic flavour.

Les Chantefables set such a fantastic high standard, I was very impressed!

Louellana and Les Chantefables voted for: Band 8 – Polnolunie

The Rolling Kegs:

Anything all Dwarf is bound to grab my attention 🙂 Kandrul was the next leader to present his competition song to us all. He chose “Call of the Mountain”. The song had a nice bluesy quality to it, with some pleasant progressive qualities to the arrangement. I noted a key change and a false ending. I would have liked a few minor tweaks to this arrangement but overall it was a solid song. The lyrics topped it off nicely with a nostalgic call back to the glorious kingdom of Durin’s folk. At 4m 30s this was good use of the alloted time.

All the Feels, I almost sobbed in to my embroidered hanky!The Rolling Kegs voted for: Band 5 – The Pale Riders

The Andune Ensemble:

Our third band of the evening was garbed in their traditional Ered Luin Blue. They performed a song titled “Human”. Transcribed by Keli, with lyrics penned by Hollyberye. This is a song born for praises, the arrangement was interesting and well planned. I was pleased to hear the bagpipes so expertly used within the arrangement. Great use of the strings too! The lyrics told a wonderful tale of the Captain of Gondor which would bring a tear to any eye. A fitting song for Minas Tirith. At 4m 8s by the end of this song I was brimming with pride for my Andune chums.

A contender for the Song Award!The Andune Ensemble voted for: Band 2 – The Rolling Kegs

Instant Play:

Instant Play are a six member musical group who play weekly on Gwaihir. Sevhis introduced their song “Still Loving You” by the Scorpions. I knew this was going to be something quite special. Instant Play are one of the bands in our community who place special importance on positioning of musicians on the stage. Balance is an important part to performance and this song did not disappoint. This was a great song for head banging! A nice use of six instruments to make the audience want to dance. With some intricate parts and a wonderful use of a fading end. At just over the 4 m mark, again good use of the allowed time.

A worthy entry – You got us all head banging!Instant Play voted for: Band 5 – The Pale Riders

The Pale Riders:

I met with Delsar a little while ago in Bree, we got to chatting about music and I asked him to bring a song to The Blue Theatre. I am so glad I did. This arrangement of Children worked perfectly in our setting. I loved the driving beat and the use of the echo really made this arrangement special. At 4m4s there was ample time to show the quality of this number. A great dancing song and with enough variation within the arrangement to keep the ear focused.

A song for the venue’s acoustics!The Pale Riders voted for: Band 4 – Instant Play

Radagast’s Pipe:

Playing “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” Radagast’s Pipe in monochrome have a similar effect. With eight folks playing Newine and his band made a strong impression.

A nice Jazz arrangement with a Clarinet on the melody. This was the favourite of many people in the audience and in The Ninny Hammers. The upbeat nature of this song can only make folk’s smile and kick a heel or two.

They used the entire time allowance with 4.42s of sound!Radagast’s Pipe voted for: Band 1 – Les Chantefables

The Tiny Duo:

The Tiny Duo became the victim of illness, so a very brave Tinybel decided to perform as a solo act. Well almost solo, with his friend Tinyhopper the Frog Chorus he played Platerspiel by Corvus Corax with perfection.

This performance was wonderful I found the piece inspired and entertaining. Almost sounded like a tune from the middle-ages.

Tinybel and Tinyhopper definatly win The Cutest Band Award. Again they used 4m 2s of the 5 minute allowance.

Froggy Fantastic! Well done Tinybel.Tinybel voted for: Band 8 – Polnolunie

Polnolunie:

A five part band next, sporting three lutes, a clarinet and a flute. Polnolunie with band leader Gerhalt at the helm played for us a song entitled Princess “Korolevna” by Windmill or Melnitsa. This was a very pleasent sounding arrangements sung with original lyrics, (as opposed to Lotro-ified lyrics). This arrangement I loved, the lyrics I found a bit wishy-washy. With the clarinet on the melody and flute singing the harmonies the most interesting thing about this arrangement was listening to the three lutes and trying to hear who had which part and how the lutes were divided. Overall a very pleasing sound one I would love to listen to again and again.

Timing: This song was 8 seconds over the allocated 5minute limit! Naughty Polnolunie…Polnolunie voted for: Band 6 – Radagast’s Pipe

The Ninny Hammer’s performed “All You Need is Love” With LOTRO-ified lyrics from Miss Hollyberye.

The Results!

Les Chantefables – 1 Point

The Rolling Kegs – 1 Point

Instant Play – 1 Point

The Pale Riders – 2 Points

Radagast’s Pipe – 1 Point

Polnolunie – 2 points

With Pale Riders and Polnolunie having 2 points each I looked to the votes of The Ninny Hammers to pick a winner. I personally decided on The Rolling Kegs as my favourite. Among our members were calls for Radagast’s Pipe but adding an extra point to their score would only confuse matters further. So I looked to see if any of the two leading bands had a vote among the Ninny’s and Polnolunie had one! I took this vote as the tie breaker and declared Polnolunie as the winner.

The Song Award: This is the award presented to the Leader of the Band, Voted by all the band leaders competing.

Winner Polnolunie.

The Buggins Boast: My personal favourite:- The Rolling Kegs.

The People’s Choice Award: An online poll hosted on TheNinny.wordpress.com:

The Rolling Kegs – With 25.8% of the total votes.

A note on the online poll: A remarkable thing happened, a magical event conspired! From the 60-ish people who were at the event on Landroval we managed to amass 353 votes! It must be elf magic! It’s like we all voted 6 times each 🙂

Lessons Learned:

Music is subjective! What one person likes another won’t, what one person thinks sounds great another will hate. But listening to every band’s song made this contest a wonderful experience.

I have had the time to listen to all the songs again, from Zed’s twitch stream and I would declare:

Les Chantefables and The Andune Ensemble bought the most intricate and well balanced arrangements.

The Rolling Kegs and Polnolunie had the most feely songs although Andune had good feels also.

Instant Play, Radagast’s Pipe and the Pale Riders had the best songs to get people moving.

Tiny had a wonderful Horn Solo!! and the cutest Frog.