Ottawa area bands to share Bluesfest spotlight: More than 60 Ottawa area bands will mix it up with the international acts at Bluesfest
Bluesfest and the city’s pop/rock community have each grown enormously over the past 16 years, and this year they’re settling into a meaningful relationship.
Sixty-plus Ottawa-area bands will play the stages of Cisco System Bluesfest between July 6 to 18, more than any previous year and way up from the number that played Bluesfest in its first year: zero.
It wasn’t that Bluesfest didn’t like local bands back in 1994, says festival founder and director Mark Monahan, it was more a case of directing scarce resources to big-name performers that could help the fledgling festival establish itself.
“The festival has clearly indicated that we want to support local music,” Monahan says in a phone interview, and adds that the festival’s growth and a general “proliferation of bands in Ottawa” in recent years has made the relationship between festival and local scene more feasible. “There’s a lot more musicians forming bands and trying to get out there,” he says.
Full story @ the Ottawa Citizen: Ottawa area bands to share Bluesfest spotlight
FaveQuest Social Media Platform Contributes to Ottawa Bluesfest Success
Sometimes a chance meeting makes all the difference. Mark Monahan, Executive Director of the Ottawa Bluesfest, and Allan Isfan, CEO of FaveQuest, met by chance at the launch of a new radio station in Ottawa in early 2009. A few short weeks later, the two companies inked a deal that would increase the festival’s web presence.This new web presence would lead to a substantial increase in engagement, word of mouth virality and more fans sharing their schedules. It would ultimately help the Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest achieve a banner year in terms of on-line attention.
“FaveQuest’s Bluesfest ViewTube has made a dramatic difference for us in terms of increasing fan engagement.”
Mark Monahan, Ottawa Bluesfest Executive Director
FaveQuest had been working on a next generation Social Media Platform to help media companies connect with people in social networks. Working in partnership with Ottawa Bluesfest staff, the platform was quickly adapted to the events market and ViewTube was launched April 22, 2009.
The result was an extension to the website filled with performer videos, sharable personal calendars, ability to invite friends through email or Facebook, a jukebox to listen to music for hours, daily news and updates, user posted videos and pictures.
In addition to the website extensions, the engaging tools were also available through the Bluesfest ViewTube Facebook application which included some special features. For example, the Facebook application allowed fans to review the entire Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest schedule and see which of their friends were going to particular shows so they could add it to their own schedule and invite other friends. All such actions showed up in the fans’ newsfeed, ultimately reaching thousands of people.
The results were truly impressive. Several hundred thousand videos were watched and over 100,000 events were added to personal calendars that people shared with one another extensively. This led to more tickets sales and many fans discovering new acts which motivated them to show up earlier to take in the festivities. Everybody wins!
FaveQuest and the Ottawa Bluesfest team are hard at work on enhancements and new features for the 2010 festival season. Many surprises are in store.
Two nights of Bluesfest rock and roll in the Market
Peter Simpson, Ottawa Citizen
The federal government sprinkled one and a half million tourism dollars over the ByWard Market a few weeks ago, and Bluesfest shows have sprung up like acting-mayors at a Shannon Tweed revival.
This has caused a run on outdoor tables around the main stage on York Street, where a patio perch at 18 or The Brig or Oh So Good coffee house is suddenly invaluable, though holding a table by sucking down caffeine for three hours could be risky when you’re watching George Clinton get all funky.
After two nights of Bluesfest in the Byward, it seems an initial success, a few bumps aside. Whether it’s attracting more tourists to the city — the stated goal of all that federal money — will better be answered next year, once the word about the new side of the festival has a chance to spread to wherever music fans may be. Which, of course, is everywhere.
Full review on the Ottawa Citizen website: Two nights of Bluesfest rock and roll in the Market
