This year’s Elevate The Arts Festival in Courtenay, BC went off without a hitch. The heart of Elevate descends yearly upon two closed off streets in downtown Courtenay for just two days. This relatively new free-fest spans the spectrum when it comes to the performers and artists represented. Along with offsite happenings like concerts and performances at local bars, this little town really turns on for a weekend. You get an almost carnival like-vibe while walking the main grounds at Elevate. You’re liable to see anything from a traditional native dance to a pop-up marching band joined by a princess on 8-foot tall stilts.
In and amongst the fray this year was a special contribution from a local favorite festival, Atmosphere Gathering, the organizers of which made the short drive down the hill from Cumberland to set up a special treat for Elevate. Under a small section of modular tent was a DJ booth, a small dance floor, and a couple dozen sets of radio frequency headphones.
This is what’s known as a silent disco, where the DJ’s song is broadcast in real time to all of the headphones, rather than out of an open sound system. Walking up on such a scene might be a strange sight indeed for the uninitiated. Thankfully, the wild gyrations and juking of the disco’s participants begins to make perfect sense when you put on a pair of the magic headphones for yourself.
We really enjoyed this little tent, spending much of the morning jamming out to local DJs, but it was what happened in the afternoon that really caught our eye. The rave escaped! Slowly dancers began to filter out of the disco into the festival grounds still wearing their headphones. Soon the tent was empty (save for the DJs going hard) and people were coming in just long enough to get a pair of the headphones for themselves.
Walking around the grounds and listening to the same song as a group of fellow dancers was an oddly satisfying experience. At times you would see another member of this headphone tribe enjoying an other performance while still listening to the DJs. The distributed rave was creating personalized culture mashups all over the place. Not to mention some beautiful spontaneous dance floors as well.
This year, Atmosphere will be unleashing their full army of silent disco headphones (some 500+ units) into the grounds of their fair festival. We have it on good authority that silent disco participants this year might be treated to something special (aside from hours of silent disco fun). We won’t spoil the surprise, but there are rumblings of a plot that may unfold for these select few.
We’ll be there to report on the festivities, but if you want to see it yourself, tickets are still available for this late summer festival in beautiful Cumberland, BC.
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