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Festival brings day of music, fun
By Jay Corn
Published:
Monday, September 27, 2004
Media Credit: Matthew Kaster
The caped musicians "Captain Yak" played the One World Festival at the Rox from 8 until almost 9 p.m. Stages at various bars around downtown St. Cloud were filled with eclectically changing performers until bar close at 2 a.m.
Downtown St. Cloud was transformed Saturday into the hosting grounds for the inaugural One World Festival, an event which took the better part of a year to plan and in addition to drawing a diverse range of people, brought together an assortment of artists, musicians and exhibitions.
Local businesses were the driving force behind Saturday's festival, with over 30 different establishments playing host to a variety of workshops, live music and art exhibitions.
Chad DeMatteis has owned Studio 505 for 4 years and said he was surprisingly pleased with the festival's success and happy with the role his downtown business was able to play in the day's events.
"What we did here was a dreadlock demonstration as well as played host to various musical performers," DeMatteis said. "What I did personally was cook a lot of food. I mean, you can't have a party without food, and seeing as this is the One World Festival, we have some Mediterranean food, some Thai food, and some cheese and crackers for the Americans just in case they can't handle some of the exotic stuff."
The musical highlight of the day for DeMatteis and Studio 505 was hosting the band Mantra Truck and their lead singer ralo. Playing the dual role of festival producer and musician, ralo said she was pleased to be able to play at a venue like Studio 505; a place that usually hosts perm appointments, not live music.
"For me as a musician, playing down here at Studio 505 where the people are so close was such a blast," ralo said. "At first we were kind of nervous about playing at a hair salon, but then I was like, 'this is going to be so cool'."
In addition to performances by various musical acts, representing a cornucopia of genres, the festival featured workshops and seminars that covered a wide range of topics and instruction. Belly dance instruction, singing improvement classes, Lakota Indian dreamcatcher workshops and creative writing improvement were just a few of the interactive, instructional opportunities ticket holders could enjoy.
Live demonstrations such as the live tattoo exhibition and the dreadlock demonstration at DeMatteis' Studio 505 were some of the day's more popular crowd attractions.
Organizers said that what One World was about first and foremost, however, was music, and there was plenty of it. Over 200 musicians performed at a variety of venues throughout downtown and sets continued well into the night.
Several musicians took advantage of the chance to play in front of packed houses, with many artists double or triple booking One World gigs.
Ray Comz and his band, 5ive before Funk, were among the many bands forced to call audibles in the face of uncontrollable circumstances, recruiting Shades of Grey drummer Jordan Wurth to fill in for them.
"We booked our appearance here tonight a few months ago, but we actually have a sit in drummer tonight, who I must say is doing a great job, because our original drummer double booked," Comz said. "It's great to just play here today though. I mean, on one hand, this is a 40 minute gig that doesn't pay. On the other hand, this is a chance to participate in the diversity that is this whole One World Festival. We've seen a lot of the bands who have played here tonight, and it's really been great."
Ian Hilmer and the Volente Band capped off the night of music at the Rox, and for Hilmer and his band, their performance at One World was just the beginning of their busy upcoming schedule.
"We're headed to Texas and then we're going on an east coast tour with a singer/songwriter from New York named Mark Aaron James, so that will be our next three months actually," Hilmer said.
Hilmer is no stranger to festivals like One World, nor to ralo, a regular festival organizer and One World's chief producer and executive.
"I've been involved with ralo for three years now," Hilmer said. "I was solo two years ago, last year I brought a buddy to the Earth Mother Mind Jam and tonight we have the whole band here. 10 p.m. is a good slot to have and I think we are the last band here tonight which is cool. It really has been a great day though. I watched some ballet today and saw my guitar player, James, play a solo show at Bo Diddley's. I just tried to check everything out."
One of the many novel concepts adopted by ralo for One World was the handling of security for the day. Brian Johnson and his fellow members of the "scrutiny" force made themselves visible by wearing yellow shirts clearly emblazoned with the word "scrutiny."
"We just didn't think we needed security for a bunch of cool people," Johnson said. "So we started thinking what we could juxtapose onto security and came up with scrutiny. We came to the conclusion that we didn't think we needed actual security, but just people to scrutinize and ask questions.
Johnson said the scrutiny volunteers were available to confused bands and festival goers alike, and said that for all intents and purposes, the day went smoothly with no major complications or problems.
"We were here today to just make sure everything went okay," Johnson said. "We started off at 9 a.m. setting stuff up and making sure bands and vendors knew where they had to go, what time they had to get there and stuff like that. We've had a couple problems with people and bands not being where they're supposed to be on time. We can't have a 12 minute lull if a band is late because then everything coming afterwards has to be pushed back. We just had to tell some bands, 'if you miss your time, we're sorry, but you missed your show'."
For her part, ralo declared the day an overwhelming success despite some concerns about slow ticket sales.
"I want to remain positive right now because it's been a super beautiful day so far and I wouldn't change anything," ralo said. "I didn't even want to think about ticket sales until Monday, but I'm already getting worried phone calls from people worried about ticket sales. I guess the sad reality of it is that if there isn't enough money made, there won't be another festival (in St. Cloud) like today's. I want people to know though that they can still buy shirts and tickets if they want to contribute to ensuring future festivals like One World."
The importance of events like One World to St. Cloud's diversity was a common thread among musicians, business owners and organizers alike.
"We need to build some kind of festival tradition in St. Cloud," ralo said. "I feel really good about everything and the diversity was amazing. Seeing (acts like) the gospel choir, the Felonious Bosch, YAWO who was here from Africa and everything in between really showed the diversity that was here today."
Studio 505 owner DeMatteis was one of many who echoed ralo's sentiments about the importance of events like One World to the St. Cloud community.
"Not to be cheesy, but I felt it was important to support downtown and ethnicity in this area," DeMatteis said "We always do this kind of stuff any chance we get a chance to improve the diversity of St. Cloud. And that's really what this is all about; improving diversity. It's such a conservative-ass bastion up here and everytime there's something different than the norm and different than the mainstream, it's just nice to help out."
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