Kickstarter

I'm crowdsourcing funds for the end of my summer tour! Long story short: getting overseas this year means that I can make it overseas every year.

Here's the story: last year, while on tour across Europe, I found a few days to hang out in Edinburgh, Scotland during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. What I found was an exceedingly fertile location for busking and a huge community of brilliant contact jugglers. There, I made an important discovery: that if I can get to Fringe to busk for a few weeks in August, I could pay my way across Europe. Performing at Fringe each year could mean that I could potentially attend the EJC, the world's biggest juggling convention, every year. That's huge for a full-time object manipulator like myself.

But since traveling over there the first time is expensive, I'm using this Kickstarter as a means of raising tour money. Once I get to Scotland I can make enough to pay for the trip - and next year's trip, which will pay for the year after's trip, and so on. In other words, I'm trying to crowdsource a one-time donation that will turn me from a domestically touring artist into an internationally touring artist.

Edinburgh is also home to lots of other contact jugglers, a rare and distinguished breed of circus artist. We've already had a handful of Edinburgh performers visit Oakland, as it's a hotspot for circus artists and especially for contact jugglers. This is an attempt to repay the favor - as well as to further knit the two circus hubs together.

This Kickstarter is for:

My friends and family
Folks who love the circus
Art patrons and others who want to support full-time artists
Successful artists who wanna throw a colleague a bone
Emerging artists who wanna increase their business karma
World travelers
Fans of contact juggling
Object manipulators who want to see more cross-pollination across the Atlantic
European fans of American accents
Anybody who still remembers the contact juggling scene from Labyrinth
Anyone not in the above categories who is good at making up excuses to do things!

Thanks y'all!

PS. More rewards to come for the non-jugglers :)

FAQ:

Isn't it a little late to be buying a ticket overseas?

Answer: Yes. This Kickstarter was supposed to be done a while ago, but it got held up by finals, by the beginning of tour, and by Amazon deciding I sounded like a sketchy person and holding this Kickstarter up for a week and a half. If I'd waited any longer on a ticket then I'd be paying out the nose, so I blew what money I had (which was benchmarked for bills) on a ticket. That's why I used the phrase "e-busking" in my video; the principle of this project is the same, but the order of expenditures has changed.

What's all this about working overseas? What if customs doesn't like that?

Fortunately, I fall perfectly into the class of performers at Fringe who doesn't need a visa: I'm from the USA and I'm a solo street performer.

How do you intend to get Scottish contact jugglers back to the US?

Peer pressure.

But actually, the hope is to make contact with artists who are interested in coming west for the fire festival circuit, much of which is coordinated from here in Oakland. Edinburgh has already been represented at many American festivals - it's just a matter of further cross-pollinating talent.

What are the specific expenses on this tour?

The amount I'm fundraising includes my flight costs, some extra money for production and distribution of rewards (a lot of postcards + photo paper), and the extra kickdown a successful Kickstarter gives to this site (and to Amazon for handling the money).

What if this project is over-funded?

Business-class flight. (just kidding!)

Having extra money in advance will help promote contact juggling workshops while I'm in the UK. The rest will probably go into the "next year's plane ticket" fund. Some might turn into a round of beer for the Edinburgh juggling club.