The Comedy/Varietè Artists

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	Al Simmons Visit website In the tradition of the great comedy kings, Danny Kaye, Spike Jones and Jimmy Durante comes Al Simmons - a man dedicated to the all but lost art of combining comedy, with song, dance, magic, sight gags and of course bad puns. His costume-and-prop routines have often been the most popular and talked about act in theatres,concert halls, and at folk, children's and other festivals across North America. We're interested to see just how many props he carries with him to Seattle. He once told me that he had worked out the math as "About seven pounds per laugh."
	Alfredo Fettucini The wonderful magic of Alfredo Fettuccini is evanescent and fleeting. It appears in this world only rarely and after great lapses of time, like Northern Lights, or Black Jack Gum, or an onslaught of destructive locusts. This veteran of many a vaudeville tour will charm you with his irrational exuberance, and astound you with his impossible repertoire.
	Amber Tide Visit website Thaddeus Spae was on the scene in the beginning when New Vaudeville/Varietè grew up from the streets in the Northwest. He helped to provide its sound track then and now. Sandahbeth was/is the love of his life. Her training as a mime, and powerful vocals lifted his contributions to a new level. You won't see them smashing a cinderblock on her belly anymore (ah, those were the days, eh?) but they just may pull out a guitar, harmonica, tamborine, guitarron, didjeridu, bass trombone, banjo-uke, hi-hat, sruti box or PVC pipe in their effort to surround and capture the musical expression they have in mind for us here at the Moisture Festival. These two are family.
	Amy G Visit website Amy G is a revolutionary cabaret comedienne who the press calls "a comic powerhouse." (The Australian) A bright joyful character who quickly won the hearts of the audience (and performers) when she roller-skated into the Moisture Festival a couple of years back. Now, she returns fresh from an extended tour down under with the illustrious variete, La Clique with whom she's played seasons in New York, Melbourne, Montreal, Dublin, Sydney and Adelaide. As the lead comedienne and director of the Daredevil Opera Company, she created and starred in their pyrotechnic clown shows, Cirkus Inferno and Rocket and Roxy's Stunt Show in 23 countries, including runs at the New Victory Theatre on Broadway, The Sydney Opera House and the Kennedy Center for the Arts. When she's not on the road, Amy G is based in Brooklyn and has been gathering spectacular acclaim in New York theater circles. She regularly emcees and performs in downtown hotspots like Weimar New York, Bindlestiff Family Cirkus, and Shanghai Mermaid as well as working uptown as writer/co-director/clown of AntiGravity's Crash Test Dummies, The Kansas City Choir Boy, and recently premiering her solo show, Amy G: On a Roll at Manhattan's Dance Theatre Workshop. Amy was born and raised in Seattle and is so pleased to be welcomed back in such style.
	Anne Uendo and Dudley Entendre As you expected from Moisture Festival, this act will deliver just what you wouldn't expect. Plays like a god, sings like an angel, with songs that bedevil.
	Armitage Shanks Visit website As the bombastic barker and ringmaster Armitage Shanks, David Crellin can be seen presenting the dark and dangerous Circus Contraption to the masses when they assemble for this spectacularly popular ensemble. Here tonight, we'll see what else he has on his mind.
	Arnaldo! Visit website Arnaldo started as a soloist with the Seattle Men's Chorus and has performed with SMC in some of the major concert halls in the US, Europe, New Zealand and Australia. In 1999, Arnaldo started a solo cabaret show to sold out runs in Seattle's trendy Capitol Hill and has since performed his one person cabaret in Portland, OR, Las Vegas, Palm Springs, Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, New York and Philadelphia. Arnaldo has also collaborated with various directors, choreographers and songwriters in the Seattle area. In 2005, he completed the Cabaret Summer Conference Workshop at Yale University. 2007 marked Arnaldo's New York cabaret debut and in 2008, Arnaldo is honored with a NY Backstage Bistro Award .
	Artis Visit website He'll deny it (probably from the stage) but he's a living legend. He turned a charming folksie household percussion instrument, musical spoons, into a performance that blew David Letterman away and produced actual music that impressed Frank Zappa. From street performing at Pike Place and folk festival stages to joining Soundgarden while they belted out the grunge tune written by them about him, Artis has walked the walk without talking the talk. He'll offer up his art (music, songwriting, poetry, string figures, and ... well ... performance art) while insisting that it ain't much. Yeah, maybe so ... but we'll watch and we'll listen. Seattle is lucky to have him.
	Baby Gramps Visit website Did you see Grampy on the Letterman show? Did you catch his songs on the Rogue's Gallery collection CD that featured Sting, Lou Reed, Lucinda Williams, Bono, Bryan Ferry, Nick Cave, Van Dyke Parks, Bill Frisell, Louden Wainwright III, and others? Did you catch him playing down at Pike Place? Have you heard that "scribbling" that he does on his guitar in the midst of things? Gramps does amazing tricks with timing, timbre, tempo and pitch that impress the musicians AND the comedians in the audience.
	Bellini Twins Visit website Their mother was a trapeze artist in The Bohemian National Circus. She was, as they say, a real swinger. Therefore this next act came to see the light of day as one of nature's most unusual experiments. These twins are from the same mother but have different fathers. Please welcome,,,, the Bellini Twins
	Big Boys with Poise Big Boys with Poise: almost a whole ton of combined weight and well over two centuries of combined experience. Flanked by the powerful Glamazons, Seattle's own Big Boys get down to a steady macho beat. Boy, do they deliver! You'll talk about this one all year!"
	Bill Robison Visit website Bill Robison is a physical comedian.....His performances are a synthesis of outlandish comedy, an elastic face, a penchant for the absurd and a reckless sense of abandon. He has been touring internationally as a solo artist and with the highly acclaimed comedy duo "The Shneedles" with their show "Luggage" They have also performed in numerous comedy festivals and German Variety theaters. Bill has toured extensively as a solo act to fairs and festivals across the US and Canada for over 20 years, where he has been the warm-up act for over 150 concerts including Bill Cosby, Bob Hope, Frank Sinatra and many, many more. He is very happy to be back in Seattle and is delighted to be part of the Moisture Festival. Enjoy !
	Bob Malone Visit website Over the last decade Bob Malone has carved out a unique niche '" burning up a quarter million miles of asphalt a year touring his own national circuit, ... pounding out his sound for devoted fans across the land then coming home to shiny, smoggy Hollywood to burn down one modern classic CD after another. Malone is a genuine hero of the by-your-own-bootstraps indie scene, and he works it like a pro: delivering the goods, night after night, from solo gigs to full-blown band with backup singers and wailing horns, and everything in between. "Bob Malone doesn't just accompany himself on piano. He supports his singing with pulsating, roaring keyboard work that grabs you and shakes you until you cry for mercy." Keyboard Magazine "Blazing and beautiful. Burning and elegant. Subtle and expansive. Unique and timeless. Malone contains multitudes of rhythm, soul, jazz, blues, smoke and magic. He's a pianist's pianist; it sounds as if he's slept inside a baby grand for years, so intimate is he with the alphabet of the ivories. [Born Too Late] is one for the ages." American Songwriter Magazine
	Booby Trap Players Performing Variety/comedy sketches both new and old, with humorous twists ... the Booby Trap Players, no doubt have fun surprises planned for this year's festival.
	Brothers from Different Mothers Visit website They were recently voted Seattle's Funniest Prop Comics and are also proud Guinness World Record Holders. They perform at over 200 events a year including their own variety show entitled "All 4 Limbs". Matt and Alex perform over 200 events a year including their own variety show: "All 4 Limbs".
	Bruce Wylie Visit website Bruce Wylie is a founding member and artistic director of the Seattle Mime Theater, which has toured throughout the United States, Asia, and Great Britain. He has created innumerable works during the past 25 years, serving as performer, writer, director, choreographer, mask maker, lighting and set designer/builder. In recent years he has created several large-cast ensemble works, as well as a solo show, Sidney Snoop - Ace Detective. Dream is one of his signature pieces.
	Caela and the Dangerous Flares Visit website From the sultry pipes of their lead vocalist, Caela, to the smooth harmonics and seductive looks of the fiery babes, you will be smitten. The exciting singing and dancing of Caela and her backup singers has thrilled and entertained in the last festival, and they return, served hot again. Rhythm and blues meets comedy/Varietè.
	Canote Brothers Visit website The Canote Brothers from Seattle, WA, are as renowned for their affable attitudes and humor as they are for their music. Greg on fiddle, and Jere on guitar, and both on banjo ukes, perform zany concerts, play for dances, lead songs and promote a good time!
	Captain Trendo and The Blue Collar Cult This new performance troupe; compose of Cedar Mielnik, Petra Doll, Morgoth and Ayana have between them a remarkable number of years of stage experience for such young entertainers. Training in dance, martial arts, acting and good solid vaudeville have made them ready to answer the challenge to test miracles on the vaudeville stage. Cinder blocks will be smashed, taps will be danced, agony will be bedded (huh?). See them!
	Charlie Brown Visit website If you catch Charlie Brown off stage and you and he have the time, try to get him to tell you a story of his travels. Some of the experiences themselves would be of interest with anyone's telling but hearing Charlie tell it would add a comic edge that'll transform it into a jewel. Recognized among jugglers as one of the finest cigar box jugglers in the world, whether it's blazing torches, balls, top hats, broadswords or machetes on his double high teeter-board, Charlie delivers the goods! He has many skills to wrap his stage presentation around but it's the man himself who entertains us most.
	Chickee and Boom-Boom Visit website Once described as Laverne & Shirley meet Abbott & Costello, Chickee & Boom-Boom are an adorable pair of bumbling beauties. These peculiar party girls dance, perform tricks, and guarantee laughs with their unique, offbeat style.
	Christian Swenson, Human Jazz Visit website Christian Swenson has an extensive background in dance, mime, voice and improvisation. He's known for his pioneering work in what he calls "Human Jazz", a global fusion of dance/drama/music for body and voice. In 1977 he received a BA in Theater from the University of New Hampshire and moved to Seattle to work with the Bill Evans Dance Company. Further training has included work with Tony Montanaro; Diane Schenker; Ruth Zapora; Korean shaman, Hi-ah Park, and with the late Pakistani master-singer, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. He has performed with Bill Irwin, The Seattle Symphony Orchestra, and The Jay Clayton/Jim Knapp Collective and in Europe with Jim Nollman of Interspecies Communication Inc. He presently teaches in the Drama programs at Seattle University and Bellevue Community College. Christian has received Fellowships from The National Endowment for the Arts, Washington State Arts Commission and Artist Trust of Washington. He resides happily in Seattle with his wife, Abigail, and two children. Yeah, but ... what is it like, the thing that he does? "I am seeking a common ground between the aliveness of improvised music and that of the wilderness." He's what? "In the safety of delight, I create worlds again and again with pulse, tonal and movement qualities akin to dancing, singing and acting for this is where we play and pretend" You do, we do? "As a tribe of one I open this window for us to taste the ageless winds." Um ... but then again ... you watch this stunning performance, unlike anything you've ever seen, and they YOU try to describe it!
	Circus Contraption Visit website Seattle's beloved one-ring circus offers patrons the following: ·A captivating Carousel of fanciful Fauna Formations! ·Audaciously effervescent (and smartly dressed) Dancing Girls! ·Animated Manikins of undisciplined and disorderly demeanor! ·Masterly displays of extraordinary Aerialism! ·Equilibrism executed with startling accuracy of judgment! ·And as always, outlandishly original Musical Arrangements of the First Quality, performed by the unparalleled Circus Contraption Orchestra! Moisture Festival will partake of a taste from that menu ...
	Clay Martin's Puppet Theater Visit website Beginning with a street show in Seattle's Pike Place Market, Clay has now performed in theaters and festivals around the world. A master of all forms of the ancient art of puppetry, including hand puppets, marionettes, shadow puppets, rod puppets, and toy theater. If you watch closely, you'll be able to see the breath of life filling these "inanimate" objects ... that's Clay.
	David Godsey Visit website David Godsey (UMO Co-Founder/Chief Artistic Officer) is a graduate of the Professional Training Program at the Circle in the Square in New York and the Laboratory of Movement Studies at Ecole LeCoq in Paris. Since UMO's co-founding in 1987, the Ensemble has been the focus and outlet for his performance work. Most recently David was lead artist for UMO's creation of FINAL BROADCAST (2007) He also directed the creation of UMO's Millennium Circus (1999) as well as Birth, Love, Death and Re-Birth (1996), a collaboration with the Seattle Men's Chorus. He currently provides artistic focus for UMO's new work series and manages the company's educational programs.
	Diemo Diemo, is perhaps the purest comic character in the festival. His father, Möppi from Münster, and grandfather, Hacki Ginda, have learned much from this master of the clown arts. He could (and has) kept the attention of these masters with his workshops in physical comedy. He'll laugh, he'll cry, and on stage he is ... well ... unpredictable.
	Dirty Fred Visit website This is a rare American appearance for Fred. We're fortunate to be able to make it work. Here's how Fred tells his life story: Born to a Lutheran minister and a former army nurse, my childhood was marked by a craving for attention. A nerd by nature, I joined the United States Marines when I was 17. After I was discharged, I flew to Europe and lived on the street while learning to juggle. I am now recently married and desperately trying to develop a sense of responsibility. So far it's been a losing battle.
	Dr. Calamari & Acrophelia Visit website The good but creepy doctor and his cool-skinned lover are remarkably nimble for those who teeter on the brink of life and death. Dr. Loligo Calamari and Acrophelia (A.K.A Jason Williams and Evelyn Bittner),.members of Circus Contraption, project a surrealist dream as they perform effortless and stylish acrobalancing and macabre dance movement.
	Du Caniveaux Dancing Bears The bears have been doing their sweet dance number now for almost twenty years and they still don't have it down. No matter, they'll have you bending over backwards as the four bears simply bend over. This year for the festival they're adding a new acrobatic number. What could possible be more pleasing?
	Duo Madrona Former lab partners and biology graduates from Haverford College in Pennsylvania, life partners Rachel Nehmer and Ben Wendel came to Seattle to explore their passion for trapeze. Working, training, and teaching within the town's aerial community honed their skills and they presented their luscious program under the name Curly Burly. They've moved to New Zealand and traveled a good bit but made a point of returning to Seattle for the Moisture Festival in years past. This year they took their new name and performance to Paris' Festival Mondial Du Cirque de Demain (the prestigious Circus of Tomorrow). Not the first thing that many would think to do with their college degrees but ... well, here's what Ben was quoted saying: "Circuses can be escapist on one hand, with bizarre characters enacting fantastical scenarios, while fundamentally human on the other, tapping into basic emotions."
	Dusty Rhodes and her Handsome Cowboys Do you crave the authentic Western cowpoke experience? The point of view of those who ride the real range and actually work among the herds? Yeah? Why'd you come to a Comedy/ Varietè Festival then? Dusty was inspired by the same cowfolk that you and I saw on TV growing up. Her's is a sweet sound, witty Western interplay, and adventure yodeling ... her cowboys are invariably handsome.
	Eric Newton Visit website Eric Newton is a rare breed of performing artist: a classically trained actor and world class aerialist. While studying, training, and performing in San Francisco, LA, and Montreal gaining experience in acting, and circus arts and touring the US and Asia, Eric Newton gathered awards as well as experience. His work with the SF Mime Troupe, Shakespeare Santa Cruz (a high-flying Ariel in The Tempest for which he won a Dramalogue Award), Theatre Rhinocerous, Berkeley Rep, Cirque Elioze, and other innovative companies prepared him well for his roles with Cirque Du Soleil and the formation of his own performance companies. He is currently working with several dedicated performers from circus, acting, dance, and music worlds in a unique blend of circus arts, narrative, and original music. This troupe is called Eye of Newt Circus ... see it! We are so pleased that Eric has found the time to join our company in Seattle this year.
	Esther Edelman Visit website Esther has over 20 years of choreographing, directing, and performance experience that spans international stages and events. She is an Artistic Director and Co-founder of the groundbreaking UMO Ensemble. Esther's passion is aerial arts and some of her choreographic and performance highlights include Ringulon alien acrobats atop the Space Needle, Silkfire fabric piece in the Hotbox at the Museum of Glass, bungee finale for UMO's Millennium Circus, Rapunzel: A Radical Aerial Telling featuring the aerial fabric, and dangling from a crane at the Point Defiance Zoo. Esther strives to create a "fluid mix of circus and aerial arts" that is "elegant and expressive" (Seattle PI). Committed to transcending the limitations of individual forms, Esther has made her mark in combining disciplines such as aerial circus and theatrical narrative to produce truly innovative work.
	Foolz Visit website Two performers: one outwardly calm, the other wound tighter than a spring. If there is a dim-witted innocence about them, it's because their childlike charm permeates their world, placing them in situations where something almost always goes wrong. Veterans of film, television, radio and the stage, Dapper Dane & Woodhead have performed for audiences on six continents. Their new show, "FOOLZ", is a character-driven amalgam of theater, music, comedy and juggling that visually demonstrates the power of cooperation between performers with vastly different dispositions.
Photo by John Cornicello	Frank Olivier Visit website When he was a kid growing up in Berkeley, California a performance troupe set up on a lot not far from his home. This group had the whiff of counterculture about them and Frank and his friends rode their bikes to their show every single day and ... well, frankly, he caught something. The group was headed up by Major Chumleigh and included an act called The Flaming Zucchini. The boys were thrilled when they came to the realization that those two characters were, in fact, being portrayed by the same mad man, Michael Mielnik (later known to the world as the legendary Reverend Chumleigh). Chumleigh (to his personal shame) had inspired a young boy to turn to a life of juggling. While the straight world lost whatever contribution that young man might have made (we'll never know, but some are nonetheless relieved) the performance world gained one of the funniest juggling acts to ever play a flaming guitar on top of a tall unicycle. Frank developed his unique offbeat brand of humor in San Francisco's comedy clubs. He was soon sharing the bill with Dana Carvey, Robin Williams, Whoopi Goldberg, and others. New York producers spotted his talents, and quickly signed him. He performed his act for the next three years in the Broadway hit show 'Sugar Babies'. Olivier has a growing number of television appearances including The Tonight Show, Comic Strip Live, and shows for PBS, HBO, BBC, Disney and more. He also headlines Las Vegas, comedy and theater festivals, and performs countless corporate shows.
	Fyodor Karamazov He spent 20-odd years (some of them very odd) touring the world as a professional juggler with the Flying Karamazov Brothers, then retired to his home in Seattle, his other home in Santa Cruz, and his other home in Hawaii. Of course he doesn't stay home all the time, he has occasion to travel as well. Fyodor (AKA Tim Furst) is also an organizer and performer with the Moisture Festival, New Old Time Chautauqua and Cirque de Flambè. No longer juggling for a living, he can be found illuminating the Moisture Festival stage either from the tech booth in back or onstage with his Light and Object manipulation.
	Gabriela Milillo Visit website Gabriela graduated from the National School of Drama in Buenos Aires and soon after was introduced to the art of trapeze which became her great love. She studied swinging and static trapeze in Argentina and San Francisco Circus School and there she had the opportunity to work with performers such as Helene Tourcotte from Teatro Zinzanni, to perfect her technique and choreography. Gabriela and her twin sister created and performed at the Twanog Twins; Trapeze, tango and theatrics. They appeared on a KCTS special with Bill Nye the Science Guy, The Pink Door restaurant, Moisture Festival, Folklife Festival, among other places around USA and South America. Gabriela is a multitask artist who has participated in children plays, classic theater, puppet theater, circus cabaret shows, film and TV acting and directing. The Seattle Weekly recently referred to one of her performances in musical and cinematic terms: "Her work on the static trapeze is almost brazenly straightforward. In short, percussive phrases, she reels off a series of still poses, like a stop-action film, cutting each one off before her momentum can be transferred to the swing and disturb its equilibrium. "
	Godfrey Daniels Visit website This tall silent character has recently returned from his first visit to Paris where he (and his close and equally silent partner Randy Minkler) were invited to present their act on the world's premier Varietè television show, Le Plus Grand Cabaret du Mond with Patrick Sèbastien. Quite a step ... recognition for a local Seattleite whose most spectacular skill seems to be catching the big red balloon that he tosses. Does none of this make sense to you? Have you never seen Godfrey do his thing? What a treat, I wish I was you. He delights us over and over but what a joy to be seeing him for the first time.
	Hacki Ginda Visit website After spending years as an artist of all trades (he did the painting that graces the entrance to the Moisture Festival's home venue at Hale's Brewery) Hacki was instrumental in helping to bring about the modern European resurgence of Varietè. Hacki's development of his stage persona during the wild touring days of the legendary Parody Paradise tent show resulted in a true original. Immediately following the fall of the Berlin Wall he hurried into the East side of town and opened the Chamaeleon Varietè. This quickly became the heartbeat of the emerging movement. Hacki's willingness to experiment onstage and to welcome new performers and new ideas onto his stages have resulted in innovation and on-the-edge humor with a taste of future history. By the way, he also initiated the first Comedy Varietè Festival ever, back in Berlin. It was that festival that inspired this one now held annually in Seattle. Oh yeah ... and he's innately and hilariously funny ... his clown peers presented him with the Golden Nose award, the highest honor at Barcelona's Festival Internacional de Pallassos (International Festival of Clowns),
	Hilary Chaplain Visit website Hilary is one of the founding members of the New York Goofs. They performed together in New York's Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and Symphony Space. She has gone on to be recognized as one of America's foremost professional physical comediennes performing throughout North and South America and Europe. Revealing the humor in everyday life she has been called "ferociously talented". Consider the words of Bill Irwin (a comic genius regarded by some as a clown god in our pantheon) "Hilary Did a 5-minute solo turn which stole the show. She looked fantastic and brought down the house with veteran clowns hooting from the wings."
	Hokum W Jeebs Visit website Vaudeville was a familiar sight across America until the Great Depression. These traveling troupers have mostly been forgotten and little evidence of their passing can be found. But the tradition lives on in the unlikely and delightful form of Professor Hokum W. Jeebs, a vaudevillian reincarnated.
	Iman Lizarazu Visit website Iman is a surprise ... and it won't matter whether or not you've read this text before seeing her. She is a master juggler, a classically trained ballet dancer, an accomplished mime and physical comedienne. She was born in the Basque region of France and partially raised backstage at Moscow's Bolshoi Ballet. She studied mime with Marcel Marceau, clowning with Avner the Eccentric and Julie Goell, she has a PHD in astrophysics, speaks five languages and yet when you see her on stage it'll come off as simple ... there's more to see if you look closer but you needn't, ... enjoy.
	Ivan Karamazov One of the founding members of the Flying Karamazov Brothers, But while the Karamazov Brothers go on, Ivan has only recently retired from full-time professional juggling. But he hasn't retired his interest in using the stage and screen to reach into our heads of people gathered for the purpose of entertainment. Trained to present Al Gore's Inconvenient Truth video to encourage people to find of ways to personally impact the future of the planet, Ivan immediately set out shortening it and adding a musical soundtrack to the experience. This is a version that fits into a vaudeville sized slot. Amazing!
	Janet McAlpin Visit website Janet McAlpin survived two years at the School of Jacques LeCoq, co-founded UMO Ensemble and has been teaching and performing clown, buffoon and physical theater for 21 years. She has worked with and/or appeared at Freehold studio, Naropa Institute, Teatro Zinzani, Circus Contraption, Cirque du Flambe, and the Moisture Festival. Madame X made her first appearance at Burning Man in1999 and inspired a following. Under the most extreme makeup, masks, or costumes, you can readily see not only her character but something deeper. (Seattle (well Vashon really) is blessed to have her as a resident.)
	Jason Webley Visit website The Wikipedia entry on Jason Webley describes his music as a combination of folk, gypsy, and punk. It goes on to say that he quit his day job in the spring of 1998, hopped on a Greyhound bus with the intention of playing in the streets until his money ran out. Good plan ... busking is one of the more successful ways of unburdening one's self of an uncomfortable nest egg. But something went terribly wrong. Jason has now released five full length albums including one that the Seattle Times called "One of the best Seattle CDs of the year". With several collaboration albums as well and a loyal following he may not get to the find out just what happens when all of the money runs out.
	Jim Hinde Visit website Jim Hinde's professional resume is more than respectable. He's at home performing at Seattle's Pike Place Market, on stage at the major folk festivals to which he's contributed his talents, on disc, and on camera (he appeared in several episodes of Northern Exposure and won a Northwest Regional Emmy Award for the PBS documentary Pike Place Market: Soul of a City.) His songs and his social activism (sometimes they're one and the same thing) show his heart and his mind are on our side. Good to know, I'd not like to have such a clever and sensible man among my enemies.
	Jim Page Visit website The great Utah Phillips once said: "Jim Page's songs get right to the point. He looks at the world clearly and reports what he sees with compassion, humor and a biting sense of irony. And boy! can he sing and play. If you're ever going to get the message, this is the messenger to get it from." The fact that this dynamic, sometimes angry political folk singer somehow seems like a natural fit for a Comedy/ Varietè Festival suggests something odd is at work here ... and it is. Whether here at our Festival or at many of Jim's other venues you won't have to pay much to hear him but you'll be cheating yourself if you fail to pay attention.
	Joey Pipia Visit website Performing magic for children at the renowned Jewel Box Theater or for adults at famous Magic Castle in Hollywood, Joey Pipia can do it all and he can do it with grace and style. Joey is a very funny magician taking audiences on an amazing journey through time and reality fashioned after the legendary traveling magicians of early vaudeville. Joey masterfully blends comedy, illusions and politics in his magical comedic performance.
	Joyce Rice Visit website Whip cracking, glass spinning, juggling, twirling, and polished entertaining ... Joyce Rice is one of the two partners who make up Rice and Renee, a well known mother/daughter team who have been featured on national television shows including the Tonight Show, Maury Povich Show, Crook and Chase, and many others. We don't have them both with us but just a small fraction of the talents of this team could fill our stage for a long time. It's a pleasure to have Joyce join us this time around.
	Juggling Jollies Visit website Amiel, Jules, and River: they're acrobatically inclined comic jugglers who learned their art early and continue to develop it with an aim to combine their experiences to create something new and, most important, something fun. Based in the Northwest, they've performed throughout the region in addition to performances in Hawaii, New York, Canada, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, France, and Spain.
	Karen Quest Visit website Karen is now in her 11th year of touring with Cowgirl Tricks, her popular Vaudeville-style Western Comedy act. She has traveled extensively in America, Europe and Asia with this fun performance (and as a juggler in one of her many previous lives), but this year she brings to the Moisture Festival a character born of those travels ...and look! She's smart, funny and just a little bit bossy. You'll laugh and you'll learn, some may cry. Make an appointment with the doctor - we'll talk.
	Kevin Joyce Visit website Kevin is Creator and Host of the Seattle Channel’s Big Night Out, now in its second season. With his wife Martha Enson he runs EnJoy Productions, which produces live entertainment for corporate and special events, as well as music, videos and leadership training, He was a Co-Founder of UMO Ensemble, and from 2000-06 Kevin was a principal performer and Director of Teatro Zinzanni, in San Francisco and Seattle. An avid singer/songwriter, Kevin’s CD Say It is available on CD Baby.
	Kevin Murphy Kevin Murphy's performance poetry presents a blend of subtlety and slapstick, grace and goof, nonpareil and non-sequitur, what? He is the poet laureate of the New Old Time Chautauqua
	Leapin' Louie Lichtenstein Visit website Leapin' Louie Lichtenstein has performed his unique cowboy comedy show in 21 different countries around the world. You will see slapdash physical comedy and spoken comedy channeled through Louie's modern western clown character. Plus world-class trick roping, whip cracking, and other odd stunts. No wonder they call him the most explosive Lithuanian Jewish Cowboy Comedian to ever come out of the Pacific Northwest.
	Leif Olson Leif bills himself as an "action-humorist". His is entertainment are the far side. Consider this description of one of his performance: "He started out juggling huge knives and flaming batons ... [but] it was the closer that got people out of their seats - some of them with cries for help. Olson donned boots that fastened to a bar, then had his young helpers lift to raise the bar over their heads, thereby dangling him, upside-down, over an aquarium full of water. It wasn't as safe as it sounds. "I have no idea what's going to happen!" Olson yelled gleefully. With that, he was submerged. Olson went red in the face and appeared to be struggling for air, as his helpers likewise struggled to lift him back out. Somebody yelled out, but then - just like that - Olson was back on his feet and grinning. "Ninety percent of all humor is the moderate discomfort of others," he said. "I like to find an edge and step over it."
	Lelavision Visit website The name Lela is more than a play on the names of the founders; derived from two Sanskrit terms meaning "creation" and "creative spark", with references to "play," it denotes the spirit of the performance group. The company combines modern and aerial dance, music, theater, and large interactive musical sculptures to create innovative works of awe and whimsy. Their work is about the transfer of energy, the emanations of the soul, and the common denominators of the human experience. Mann and Lamblin work with a synthesis of form, space, movement, and music in a collaboration that draws on the unique contribution of each. Ela Lamblin is a sculptor/musician who is known in Seattle for his past collaborations with the UMO Ensemble. Lamblin's musical instrument/sculptures represent a harmony of sound, form, and movement meant not solely to be looked at and walked around but to be sounded and intimately experimented with. They appeal both to the ear and to the eye and, because they are thematically indicative, to the soul and to the consciousness.
	Linda Severt Visit website "Wow! Very funny! Shades of a female Pee Wee Herman, Lily Tomlin's "Edith," and Gilda Radner." Uniquely dynamic, uniquely versatile, Linda Severt has enthralled audiences from Washington DC to Toronto to Shanghai with a vibrant blend of music and physical comedy since 1987. Master of an astonishing range of musical instruments and theatrical techniques, Linda dazzles eyes and ears, fusing music, puppetry, circus arts and European style clowning into solo performances of great originality and wit. Linda also works as a "Doctor of Delight" for the Big Apple Circus Clown Care Program at Children's Hospital, and as a musician for Integrated Music at Harborview Medical Center. Performance highlights include: The Kennedy Center - Washington DC, Kim Tom International Clown Festival - Shanghai, China, International Children's Festivals in Vancouver, Toronto, Calgary, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Seattle, Prince Rupert Comedy Festival - BC, Canada, Canmore Folk Festival - Alberta, Canada, Western Circus Week - Hong Kong, China. "Circus in a blender!"
	Magical Mystical Michael Visit website Magical Mystical Michael's illusive and elusive logic still has some of his closest friends scratching their heads and laughing. You'll see many of Michael's friends at the Moisture Festival, he's an easy guy to befriend, onstage or off, he brings laughter from your heart. Michael has performed for audiences worldwide: from the corners of Asia to deep in the Himalayas to Europe, Canada, Mexico, and of course, the United States. He mixes play, wordplay and audience interplay into a hilarious and entertaining trip.
	Matt Hall Visit website Matt Hall began his juggling career at the tender age of age 27, after he purchased Charlie Dancey's Encyclopaedia of Ball Juggling and vowed to learn every trick in the book. > > Known as the "Juggle Sensei", he has garnered several awards, including the International Jugglers' Association Individuals Silver medal, the IJA Peoples' Choice Award, and the 2005 IJA Overall Prop Champion. He has performed, taught juggling workshops, and emceed in places like Scotland, England, Australia, Israel, Canada, The Netherlands, and Denmark. > > His philosophy of juggling is the same as his philosophy of public high school teaching--"I'm in it for the money." Seriously though, Matt thinks of himself as a regular guy who keeps ending up in amazing situations. In recent years, he has been asked to instruct at Cirque du Soleil, has been used as the model for the Kinetic Juggling Superstar T-Shirt line, received an invitation to go to Taiwan to judge and instruct at its national diabolo championships, emceed the IJA Stage Championships, and was featured on the cover of JUGGLE Magazine in 2007
	Michael Clifton One the best show drummers on any circuit, ask any of the many vaudeville/ Varietè acts who've done their turn with his support from the band pit. Michael's coming in from Berlin for the Festival and, happily for us, he's bringing his solo rhythm act with him. An undisputed wild man ... with a beat.
	Mik Kuhlman Visit website "She creates beautiful images that capture both the freedom and fear in a child's-eye view of the world." thus begins a review of Mik Kuhlman's spectacular one-woman show, Split Second. This show combined comedy, mime, and performance art with literary movement and physical theater. Does that sound a bit serious? So might her resume: Associate Artistic Director of Seattle Mime Theatre, Associate Artist with UMO Ensemble, work with Teatro Zinzanni and Bumbershoot, her residency at the Chateau St Julien l’Ars, France with the Ardeo Theatre Project, her work with stage, television and film in America and in France and her MFA in acting from California Institute of the Arts ... But Mik's study, her experience, and her intelligence might well inform her stage work but it's her stage play that'll keep you smiling and laughing out loud. We're lucky to have her working for Moisture Festival on stage and off.
	Mildred Hodittle In Mildred, Tash Wesp has created a character who can simultaneously chastise, worry, and delight an audience. Everyone's eccentric aunt, Mildred Hodittle, wearing one of her signature turquoise outfits and offering her ... um ... lessons, is capable of remarkable juggling and other physical feats but the greater skill is her ability to take our attention and direct it to whatever it is that she would have us know.
	Mlle Linda Visit website Mlle Linda ???? The security girl ????.....Tsss Tsss Tssss, you don't want to go there, better if you don't meet her eyes. She's an iron hand in a velvet glove, or a velvet glove in an iron hand...depends on how she feels.....well, she's always on a bad mood, but if you meet her watch out, you're gonna fall in love .... guarantee.
	Mme Zazou Visit website Mme Zazou AKA Doloreze Leonard ... the European Weekly referred to hers as "a voice that Louis Armstrong would have envied." Business Woman Magazine called her a "French Canadian girl who blossomed into perhaps one of the most daring and spirited woman performers of her time." SF Chronicle singled her out among the "contingent of French Canadians and Cirque du Soleil alumni" as a "lusty mistress of ceremonies" a sort of "Mae West with a zesty Quebecois accent." We say "Vive!"
	Moz Wright Cold Steel and Hot Licks! Fire breather/sword swallower, Moz, grew up in a circus family, though his immediate family had settled down by the time he came along. His uncle was the "sideshow talker" for Clyde Beatty Cole Bros. (among others) and Moz would ride in the truck on parades to throw candy to the kids as his grandmother (a renowned calliope musician) played. This helped to infect him with the show bug early. Taught the fundamentals of fire and sword manipulation by his uncle, Moz improved on and added skills and stage savvy through dedication to his art. If you've only ever seen fire spitting or the mislabeled fire eaters becoming common today Moz's Fire Breathing performance will be a revelation. His interest in Vaudeville, Varietè, and performance art led him to work producing shows along the west coast and especially as the Entertainment Co-ordinator at the Oregon Country Fair for ten years. He has performed at festivals across America and Canada, appeared on BBC TV from London and shared the stage with many notables: Hot Tuna, Country Joe McDonald, Ken Kesey, Wavy Gravy, Johnny Klegg, U. Utah Phillips and the Grateful Dead to name a few. He lives and works in Portland Ore.
	Mud Bay Jugglers Visit website Masters of levity is several senses of the term. Mudbay has brought their innovative approach to juggling for over 25 years now. They've passed some of their knowledge and experience on while passing clubs. They work to music or in silence but you won't miss the message. See what happens when drama, choreography and juggling create a flashpoint with the complex world of music. Still, as one member put it, "Even after 20 years, our best times are when the clubs just float in the air and we're not thinking about anything but the fun we're having with the people around us."
	Möppi His name is Möppi. It is sometimes written Moeppi and pronounced Moeppi ... no, not like that, Moeppi! Here let me moosh your lips from the side while you say it ... Möppi ... yeah, with an umlaut. Moeppi with an umlaut. He's from Münster, Germany (if you couldn't get the o with umlaut, forget the u with umlaut) but he now lives in Seattle with his bride and baby (see Diemo bio). Clown bloodline ... ewwww.
	Nanda Visit website Young men, high energy dance, kung-fu acro fighting, juggling, sonic soundscape, comedy, ... a tidal wave of talent. What more were you hoping for? Wait, that's coming too. Whether enlivening festivals, corporate events, theatrical productions or the Port Townsend City Hall (see the pics on their website) these guys bring power in addition to skill and joy ...
	Nate Cooper Visit website He is a natural physical comedian and eccentric dance aficionado. An endlessly talented clogger, tap and swing dancer, juggler, roller skater and clown. Dedicated to the art of play, Cooper explores physical limitation through clown logic. Since joining us at Moisture Festival he has gone on to become a star in New York and Miami's spectacular Absinthe shows.
	Neonman Visit website Neonman is a performance piece created by Henrik Bothe of Denmark. In a blackout, a glowing, flexible stick figure appears on the stage. He manipulates luminous objects and chases his head around the stage. Neonman tried to help a plane land with catastrophic results. The performance includes juggling, stick twirling, physical comedy and, some might say, magic!
	New Old Time Chautauqua Visit website Their vaudeville variety shows run 2 - 2 1/2 hours and often include everything from comediennes to jugglers and tap dancers, from rap singers to rope-spinners and bubble-blowers and from poets and magicians to ... well, whatchya got? The Fighting Instruments of Karma Marching Chamber Band/Orchestra accompanies each performance with music, sounds, and wisecracks. Their performances take place in theaters, schoolyards, prisons, ball fields, ferry docks, or ... well, whatchya got?
	PK Dwyer Visit website Many Seattleites, familiar with PK's unforgettable music and stage presentations believe that he's a native of the Northwest. The same could be said of people in the other towns where he's spent time playing and living with their musicians: New York City, Venice Beach, Paris, the Smokey Mountains of North Carolina ... He's given his own twist to as many genres of music as towns: folk, cabaret, rock 'n roll, movie soundtracks, cabaret, cow punk, and his early love ... the blues. PK has been born again into the blues in this, his latest incarnation. But whatever the form we can be sure that the man will deliver with style.
	Poppy Day Visit website Poppy is a character created by Lara Paxton, co-founder, artistic director of Seattle's own Circus Contraption. She appreciates the unexpected, the dark, the disturbing, and the non sequitur. Shredded wheat. She rejects the question, "Why?" as applied to art.
	Princes of Pain Seattle natives, the Princes of Pain, began performing together as magicians at the age of thirteen, but quickly grew disillusioned after several grueling years on the birthday party circuit. At the age of fifteen, the two young performers were lured by the gravelly siren's call of the sideshow, and haven't looked back since. The Princes of Pain have performed at countless fairs and festivals across the Northwest, and are grateful for the opportunity to bring their cringe-inducing brand of variety entertainment back to their hometown for the Moisture Festival.
	Professor Humbug's Flea Circus Visit website Is it real? Can fleas be trained? Is that a tiny circus? What do they eat? Do you really want to know? After much research into those and other questions this is Rob D'Arc's educated hunch on the lives and loves of buggery. His now famous flea circus shows demonstrates the loose alliance through history between and among theater, sideshow, and bar bets. A trained and skilled puppeteer, Rob may or may not answer your questions but you're unlikely to care so much about the facts as you do about the brilliant presentation of a page from show business history.
	Queen Shmooquan Visit website WHO IS QUEEN SHMOOQUAN? Jeppa K(no period) Hall, through her alter ego Queen Shmooquan (shmoo like "shmooze" and quan like "kwan") manifests unusual stories and bizarre images, creating a new performative mythology. Queen Shmooquan is a modern day oracle... a transcendental burlesque clown. The Queen vacillates between many different worlds, intermarrying the familiar imagery of the shared collective americana consciousness, with the unknown and the cosmic, to create smart, beautiful, and surreal landscapes. She is the fool. The woman child. The innocent and the all knowing. Queen Shmooquan has the ability to access experiences outside of her own cultural location. Using her transformative powers, Queen Shmooquan takes the audience on psychedelic, super-real journies, that regardless of their abstract imagery, remain at their heart completely universal and emotionally accessible. She transcends her american Walmart type purgatory, creating ecstatic experiences for herself, her audience, the world and all its inhabitants. Queen Shmooquan as Jeppa is also known as GOATGIRL AND HER 21ST CENTURY STORYBALLADS.
	Raspyni Brothers Visit website As one of the most sought after acts on the corporate entertainment scene, they appear annually at over 100 events across America and internationally. Since 1982 their intelligent mayhem has earned them two International Juggling Championships, multiple appearances on The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson and Jay Leno, and a place in the Guinness Book of World Records.
	Red Wine Sisters Visit website Paula Bliss (link to her website by clicking on the blue link to the right) and Pipa Pinon (her website can be found at this url address: www.dreambeach.net) have long joined their talents and we are happy to have them together at this year's festival. From Santa Cruz, California, the Red Wine Sisters were spotted by Moisture Festival organizers while performing at an events entitled: Keep Santa Cruz Weird. They seemed to be helping greatly with that goal. Paula Bliss and Pipa Pinon have played music and shared wine together for over 20 years. You're invited here to share the pleasure of longtime friendship. Enjoy.
	Reggie Miles Visit website Reggie Miles, with Rusty, the Singing Saw and his daredevil handsaw hokum will grace our stage again. There was a time when the musical saw was a part of most every vaudeville band. This remarkably versatile instrument, if it is seen at all today, is seen as a novelty instrument but in the hands of a master like Reggie you'll see that music isn't an after thought ... it's the point. We're lucky to have him.
	Rhys Thomas JuggleMania Visit website Whether walking up a stairway of blades, gliding along a slack rope, juggling pins, spinning crockery on sticks (for no known reason) or offering other circus-style feats Rhys Thomas' climb-up, lay-down, stand-up comedy reassures us that he's too smart to fall, drop, cut, or otherwise turn this charming performance into the catastrophe that he is continually skirting.
	Ricochet Visit website Based just north of Santa Fe in the beautiful mountain village of Penasco, Richochet is the collaboration of Laura Stokes and Cohdi Harrell. A tincture of pedestrianism and refinement, mixed with brokenness and a splash of romance. Using their seamlessly crafted performance style, Ricochet is a look inside the complexities and absurdities of the human condition.
	Rob Williams No telling what he has planned this time but the last time we saw Rob at the Moisture Festival his act consisted of removing meat from packages, peeling plastic wrap off of cheese slices, putting mayonnaise and mustard onto bread and making a bologna sandwich!? ... Like abstract or dada art, there were many who, upon hearing that that was his plan, had said "my kid could do that." It's not like the guy is without talent. He was one of the famous Flaming Idiots who took their comedy show to theaters across the country and on to Broadway. The N. Y. Times gave them high praise: "They demonstrate what escapist entertainment is all about." (well, high praise to those of us who work in this field of the business). ... did I mention that he made those sandwiches with his bare feet? Yeah, they were clean feet (we watched him wash up first) and yeah, someone ate the sandwich (so did Jay Leno when he did it on his show). But again ... we don't know what he's bringing this time. We just know that Rob Williams will make you laugh at odd times ... and that's an art in itself.
	Rod Ferrone Visit website Rod Ferrone has received critical acclaim worldwide for his unique blend of tap dance, comedy, song and hat tricks. He was 1/2 of the critically acclaimed tap/comedy duo Hot Foot. His company Feet 2 the Beat has also received high praise from audiences and critics alike. He was featured in several groundbreaking tap shows including "Urban Tap" (Broadway), "Cool Heat Urban Beat" (world tour), and "Camut Band" (Europe). He is a veteran of the Reel to Real series at Lincoln Center, having performed in tributes to Jimmy Durante, James Cagney, Donald O'Connor and Ray Bolger. He has performed at the Kennedy Center in the Holiday Vaudeville Show, and at numerous festivals, including the Tap Extravaganza (NYC), Tap City (NYC), Panasonic and JVC Jazz Festivals (NYC), Moisture Festival (Seattle), and Lincoln Center Out-Of-Doors. He teaches master classes worldwide in both tap and the art of hat manipulation and has given lecture/demonstrations for the "Meet the Artist" program at Lincoln Center. He recently did a one-month residency at the Lexington School for the Deaf in NYC, teaching tap, hat tricks and vaudeville shtick and he performed his one-man show, "The Tap Cat in the Hat" at the Fort Salem Theater in Salem, NY. He is currently performing at the Box in New York City. on YouTube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zJzVDVaGag
	Ron W. Bailey There are many people whose hard work and creativity makes the Moisture Festival happen but there is one without whom it wouldn't have been an option. Ron W. Bailey is an entertainer, band leader, singer, songwriter, and a Maker. He makes things happen. His visit to one of Berlin's two Comedy/Varietè festivals in the 1990s inspired this unique contribution to Seattle's musical and theatrical landscape. Ron's romance with Seattle began ... but wait ... let me allow Seattle songsmith Jim Page to tell it: "Anyway, in '74 along comes Rose and The Dirt Boys - they're out of Oklahoma and they just moved right in and made themselves at home. You could do that here in those days, it was that generous. Well, one of the brains of the dirt boys was Ron Bailey, or RB as they called him. A compact little Scotts Okie with a great voice and an unstoppable mind for invention. He began collecting talented friends. He became kind of a magnet around which a lot of interesting people revolved. When The Dirt Boys broke up RB went on to the Dynamic Logs - a band that was larger or smaller depending on the circumstances. And that's when things began to get real theatrical. Anyway, making long stories shorter ... The Royal Famille Du Caniveaux was born somewhere in there, involving strange shadowy figures in Spain and Paris and New York, and they all started going to the Oregon Country Fair. So did a lot of jugglers and magicians and dancers and singers and all the rest. The Flying Karamazov Brothers, Tom Noddy, Faith Petric. So It was a natural progression if you look at it that way. It just had to happen. And where else [but Seattle] could it have been?" Ron ... Seattle and the Varietè performers you've brought to this pretty city thank you.
	Run For Your Life!...it's a dance company! Visit website Run For Your Life!'s mission is to make people laugh. Their abstract comedy has no malice or agenda, and their satirical dances point up universal human (or non-human) foibles. This year Ms. Mini Driver, a Municipal Railway employee, leaves her heart in San Francisco, in Halfway to the Stars.
http://www.circuscontraption.com/bios.html#Kpod	Sally Pepper Visit website She dances! She stilt-walks! She floats in the air! Is there anything she can't do? She is a multi-talented aerialist, dancer, acrobat, costumer, and stilt walker. Her awe inspiring rope swing routine shows her performance skill and proves that she is one of the top aerialists in Seattle.
photo: Timothy Aguero	SANCA Visit website The School of Acrobatics and New Circus Arts (SANCA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to improving the mental and physical health of children of all ages, and is dedicated to serving students from all economic backgrounds by offering tuition scholarships. Seattle's premier circus school was founded by Executive Director Jo Montgomery and Program Director Chuck Johnson. By day Jo is a pediatric nurse practitioner, but at night moonlights as a circus arts instructor. Like many pediatric care providers, Jo noticed an alarming increase in the rates of childhood obesity and started the school as a creative and practical way to address the problem. Chuck's interest in circus began at age 10 when his grandparents took him to a circus show in Portland. Soon after that he taught himself to juggle and began gymnastics training. As an adult Chuck helped found the Cascade Youth Circus and has been involved professionally in circus, gymnastics coaching, stunt work and rigging. SANCA opened its doors in January 2004 with 5 students and a trampoline, but is now home to two trampolines, trapeze rigs, vertical ropes, a tumbl-trak, tight wires, unicycles, German Wheels, a million juggling balls, and lots of circus fun! The school offers classes in acrobatics, circus arts, aerial training, hoop, juggling and trampoline and even has a circus band for those more musically inclined. With over 500 students of ALL ages, and a satellite program on Vashon Island, SANCA proves that it's never too late to join the circus!
	Shoehorn Visit website Shoehorn is an original performance artist who creates music with his feet and dances with his horn. Michael Shoehorn Conley has combined organic body rhythms and sophisticated jazz forms and concepts into an entertaining spectacle. While specializing in sax and tap dance, he is a multi-instrumentalist, arranger and composer, utilizing a variety of wind and percussion instruments, original poetry and songs and an ear for music from around the world.
	Simon Neale Visit website Simon cuts an elegant figure as he hosts Moisture Festival shows in his Utilikilt and East End, London accent (modified to allow Americans to understand). Simon's sense of comedy harkens back to Music Hall and to the British traditions of "Panto". Relax, you're someplace else now.
	Smerdyakov Karamazov The brilliant vaudevillian, Ed Wynn, once said "A comedian is not a man who says funny things. A comedian is one who says things funny." As, variously, a solo performer (Samwise, Juggler Intraordinaire,) a founding-partner in the hilarious Laughing Moon Theater, and then one of the quartets and quintet called The Flying Karamazov Brothers, Smerdyakov (a.k.a. Sam Williams) had nightly views of laughing faces as he gamboled across stages offering his oddly twisted but clearly friendly point of view on events around him. Sam still lives in his hometown of Seattle and, when persuaded now and again to act as presenter or performer, he reminds us anew of that core attribute of a comedian of which Ed Wynn spoke. It's not an act, he thinks that way.
	Steffon Moody Visit website Professional Goof Ball, Steffon Moody, engages in regular stand up humor and physical comedy. He is a founding member of the UMO Ensemble, a performer with Big Apple Circus Clown Care, part time Zambini Brother and managing director of www.ChameleonPerformance.com . He is also a Daddy to two beautiful, yet somewhat goofy, children. And, hubby to a beautiful wife who would not appreciate being called "goofy". Life is good. That is all.
	Tamara the Trapeze Lady Visit website Tamara "The Trapeze Lady" can be seen every Friday night hosting and performing in her Columbia City Cabaret! Featuring Seattle's, and the world's, sexiest variety stars!
	Tess-Toss-Tyrone by Johnny Jetpack Propulsion Labo Visit website Whether he's bringing us the giant man-eating squirrel, gas propelled Johnny Jetpack speeding skyward at 50+ mph (in about one second), or YouTube favorites Flaming Anus or the incredible and hilarious Cordless Drill Breakdance, Nathan Arnold has earned a reputation in certain circles as a man with a dangerous sense of vision and the much more remarkable willingness to see them through.
	The Aerialistas Visit website The Aerialistas create a daring and acrobatic aerial show with hoops, ropes, rings and fabric. With backgrounds in gymnastics, dance, yoga, trapeze and theater, The Aerialistas combine athleticism and art in an intense, sultry performance that must be seen to be believed.
	The Bobs Visit website The Bobs are a phenomenon in show business ... These Grammy nominated musical arrangers are four funny humans who take their music seriously. They're the world's only new wave a cappella singers but they don't shy away from using instruments if the mood strikes. Since they shared the Moisture stage with us they've put out a new CD: Get Your Monkey off my Dog and a DVD documentary archiving their 25 year history: Sign My Snarling Movie.
	The Cabiri Visit website In the words of Herodotus, "Those who have been initiated into the Mysteries of the Cabiri will understand my meaning..." The Cabiri, a Seattle-based performance troupe, specialize in 'performative mythology', theatrical depiction of tales from folklore and mythology. Utilizing modern and aerial dance, stilt walking, physical theatre, and puppetry, The Cabiri transcend the human form. Members of the troupe teach ongoing aerial dance classes in West Seattle and perform regularly at The Pink Door restaurant. Don't miss their summer show "Prayer to the Gods of Night" in July 2008 at Shorecrest Performing Arts Center in Shoreline, WA.
	The Velone Sisters An aerial affair presented by Martha Enson of the UMO Ensemble and Cathy Sutherland of the Aerialistas and Du Caniveaux. They mix beauty, poetry, and strength in their stunning act on the vertical rope. Their debut at last year's festival was very powerful and revealed their ability to deliver "wow".
	Tom Murphy Visit website Knock 'em down, drag 'em out, laugh till you cry slapstick sketch comedy. Think: Buster Keaton meets Robin Williams. He co-founded two international touring comedy troupes: Mountain Mime and Klown Shoes. For the past 20 years he has performed and taught around the world. He was a winner at the Festival Mondial du Cirque de Demain in Paris and twice awarded "Artist of the Year Award" by Künstler Magazine in Germany. He has appeared on Broadway in his solo production called MetaMURPHosis. For the past 10 years he has been touring in Europe where he was dubbed "The Chaos Poet."
	Tom Noddy Visit website Tom has done something unique in show business ... he created a new kind of act. When Tom Noddy first took his performance of Bubble Magic onto the Tonight Show in the early 80s (the first of 3 such performances on that show) Johnny Carson was able to say "He's doing something unlike anything we've ever seen." There are now other performers presenting shows featuring skill with soap bubbles ... but here at Moisture Festival you'll be seeing an original. Tom missed last year's Moisture Fest because of an extended engagement in Singapore, and just before that he was in New York to do the Late Show with David Letterman but, he says, gathering with his friends and seeing them on stage and off is always the highlight of the year.
	Trio Manchego "Vaudeville audiences loved watching things spin." Greg Palmer
	Trixie Little & the Evil Hate Monkey Visit website Direct from Charm City comes Trixie Little and her nemesis the Evil Hate Monkey! This burlesque pair has performed at Tease-O-Ramah in Los Angeles, The NYC Burlesque Festival, and with Cherry Red Productions' Vaudeville Night! in Washington, D.C. Apparently, a random bolt of lightning turned Trixie into a superhero, her pet monkey into a super villain, and formed them into lifetime enemies at the same time. Witness the battle-royal as Trixie Little fights Monkey Boy and saves the world as only a superhero can!
	Ukoiya and Anneka of Dream Science Circus Visit website Anneka Deacon and Ukoiya Mastin have been performing together for over 4 years. They are best known for their performances with U & I Productions (a company co-founded by Ukoiya) in Dream Science Circus and Sleeping on the Ceiling. Based out of Bellingham, Washington, Ukoiya and Anneka's creative endeavors have entranced audiences across the U.S. and abroad. They both perform on a variety of aerial apparatus, on stilts, and in acrobalance acts. Offstage, both teach circus arts, design and create fantastical costumes, makeup, and puppetry. Both women contribute to the well being of their communities in other ways; Anneka is a licensed massage therapist and Ukoiya is a personal trainer and yoga instructor.
http://www.umo.org/aboutumo.html	UMO Visit website In the past seventeen years, UMO Ensemble has become known as one of the most innovative, compelling and critically acclaimed performance companies based in the Pacific Northwest. The Ensemble has performed in theaters, at festivals and in schools throughout the Northwest, the United States, Canada and Europe. When you laugh out loud you're wide open. This troupe has some ideas of what they want to give you while you're open like that ... but the first thing is the laughter to open you up. We're all lucky to have UMO.
	Zero Boy Visit website Zero Boy is a Vocal Cartoonist. From his New York base, Zero Boy has written, directed and performed numerous productions on both coasts and Europe, working in traditional theater, stand up comedy, television, street performance festivals, radio, film, comic books, a national magazine, and on the cutting edge of digital media/art. MTV's M2 network has featured his unique work and he was recently featured on WNYC's "The Next Big Thing", VH1, "Fox and Friends" and "Good Day New York". He has been on the radio all over America and the world doing Stump Zero Boy.
	Zipcode Man Visit website Who out of the 6 billion people on on this planet can juggle seven balls, invent very funny stories on the spot, and recite the location of every zip code in America and abroad? Meet David Rosdeitcher, an unusual performer, who has been captivating audiences all over the world for the past decade.
photo by John Cornicello	zoom ----- Moisture Festival Volunteer Staff Visit website This is a cropped photo of a small fraction of the many volunteers that worked together to staff the Moisture Festival in 2007. Some will be back this year some were here in previous years and there were and will be many others making contributions for the pleasure of being a part of this joyous event. Anyone who thinks that the stage "thank you"s for our staff are perfunctory or insincere have never worked hard for no money for a greater cause nor watched as others worked at your side doing the same. In addition to your mental and physical contributions we are aware of the literal truth of the phrase "we couldn't have done it without you". The continual flow of love and encouragement that comes from those who stay close before and after the public fills and empties the theater is the fuel that keeps this place warm. We say it sometimes but feel it more often ... thank you. We couldn't have done it without you.