Oktoberfest - Harvard Square, Cambridge, MA

WHEN: Sunday, October 2nd, Noon-6PM
WHERE: Harvard Square, Cambridge, MA

WHAT: Oktoberfest is essentially the same thing as Mayfair, but, you guessed it, in a different month. Despite the rain at Mayfair, it was a great opportunity to expose the BYOV booth to lots of new people and to get some interesting recordings as well. I hope that the same will prove to be true for Oktoberfest, and I hope even more that we don't get rained on. Since that incident, I have made a few modifications to the booth involving marine epoxy and permanent markers, so even if we do get a bit of rain, I will be better prepared.
I do not yet know where the booth will be positioned, but most likely it will again be next to Out of Town News. There should be a bunch of interesting vendors, artists and music going on, so there will be plenty of entertainment to go around.

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Summary:

Number of voices recorded: 26
Reading sheets used: 9, 14, 13
Weather: sunny and hotter than one would have expected
Level of success: high - lots of voices and general interest
Records broken: number of times I explained what a big plywood box was doing on the street in Harvard Square
Photos: Check them out

This time around in Harvard Square, things were much more under control. Not only have I gained important BYOV event experience, but the weather was dramatically better than last time. The biggest problem with the booth was that it got a bit hot when sitting in the direct sun, but thankfully I had a fan to cool things off so it wasn't too bad.

There were tons of people walking by, asking questions, reading the text on my scrolling message sign or just simply seeing the booth, so this was a great marketing event. Having been in New York the day before for a four hour event, I was a bit nervous that another six hours of explaining and recording might be a bit much, but it went much faster than I expected. I was glad to not be off to a different city that night though.

Thanks a lot to Kris B. for the MAJOR assistance setting up and breaking down as well as to Crystal B. (hmm...Kris B. and Crystal B....I'm not making this up!) for being a remarkably pleasant draftee.

As usual, click below to access some representative audio clips:

hellosunnyhello

a peppered rain

very tall things

it's made out of stuff, of course

not so good at it

tornado

singing not required

the tension of hate

thirds

comfortable unknowns

greater power

icy

I do too