Video: Rehearsing for Shlomo’s Glasto Circus
Here’s an exclusive behind the scenes video of preparations for Shlomo’s Glasto Circus featuring Ed Sheeran (who is currently at number 3 in the charts!), Bellatrix (World Female Beatbox Champion) and Rob Broderick (ridiculously talented comedy freestyle rapper from Abandoman).
Watch the LIVE STREAM of Shlomo’s Glasto Circus on Fri 24 June
For those of you who can’t make it to Glasto:
We will be broadcasting live, right here, from the biggest festival in the world! Lyrix Organix in partnership with Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) have a huge stageshow at Zona Bassline in The Common on Friday night, featuring the biggest and best artists from the UK underground – including Example, Ed Sheeran, Shlomo, Toddla T, True Tiger, P Money and many, many more! Get your tea and watch it mud-free from your bedroom. It’s going to be truly epic.
SHLOMO’S GLASTO CIRCUS
1.15am BST on Friday night (Saturday morning)
NB The broadcast starts at 10pm with the running order below:
10.00pm KAYA
10.30pm DJ (Cal Jader)
11.00pm LATIN DUB SOUNDSYSTEM
11.30pm DJ (Cal Jader)
11.45pm THE BOXETTES
12.15pm Special Guest
12.30pm ED SHEERAN
01.00am DJ
01.15am SHLOMO’S GLASTO CIRCUS + surprise guests
02.20am EXAMPLE
03.00am TODDLA T + MC SEROCEE
03.45am GENTLEMANS DUB CLUB + P MONEY
04.15am TRUE TIGER
05.00am ENGINE-EARZ EXPERIMENT + special guests
06.00am close
Shlomo’s Glasto Circus 2011
UPDATE: SHLOMO’S GLASTO CIRCUS TO BE STREAMED LIVE!
This year at Glastonbury Festival I will be hosting a special one hour collaborative show called SHLOMO’S GLASTO CIRCUS late on the Friday night, featuring a host of my favourite guest artists. It’s in aid of MSF as part of Lyrix Organix’s takeover of the Bassline Circus in The Common.
But equally as exciting: earlier on the Friday night I will be performing and compering on the gigantic West Holts stage, introducing the 3 headline acts, none other than Jimmy Cliff, Chase and Status and Cee-Lo Green.
WHOOOP!!!! More festival announcements are coming soon 
Plus I’ll be doing glasto with a new baby. Wish us luck!!
My glasto 2010
Glastonbury 2010 was SO warm… almost unbearably hot at times
I did a little unannounced set jumping up before the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble on the Park Stage. Here’s a tiny video of the very end!
That evening we heard a rumour that Radiohead were about to play on Park. We ran down and saw a stunning performance from Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood
Glasto Sunset
Stevie Wonder closed the festival and got Michael Eavis up to sing hapy birthday to Glastonbury. Stevie is one of my idols and I think it was the best Glasto headliner i’ve seen!!!
Video: Shlomo with Imogen Heap at Glastonbury 2010
Here’s a video of my impromptu duet with the lovely Imogen Heap on the Other Stage at Glastonbury Festival 2010. I really enjoyed it, we had a lightning fast runthrough backstage while imogen was stressing about her hair and makeup… i felt a little underdressed in my sandals!!!
Babelbox Podcast episode 6: Festival special
The Babelbox podcast Episode 6 is out now. It’s a Festival Special for Summer 2009, covering Glastonbury, Womad, Latitude, Big Chill, and Africa Express in Paris. Featuring the Vocal Orchestra, Corinne Bailey Rae, Jarvis Cocker, and Tony Allen.
Listen now, or subscribe using iTunes.
Shlomo’s Glasto diary 09 – Part 4 – JARVIS COCKER
Final part of Shlomo’s Glastonbury diary featuring Jarvis Cocker singing Fat Children with Shlomo and the Vocal Orchestra.
Shlomo’s Glasto diary 09 – Part 4 – MARCUS BRIGSTOCKE vs BELLATRIX beatbox battle
Part four of Shlomo’s Glastonbury diary featuring BBC Radio 4′s MARCUS BRIGSTOCKE challenging BELLATRIX (World Female Beatbox Champion 2009) to a battle of the beats. Ouch.
Part five is out next week!
Watch it HERE.
Shlomo’s Glasto Diary ’09 – part 3 – IMOGEN HEAP becomes honorary VOCAL ORCHESTRA member
Part three of Shlomo’s Glastonbury diary featuring an improvised collaboration between IMOGEN HEAP and SHLOMO AND THE VOCAL ORCHESTRA!
Part four is out next week!
Video by http://www.asdescribed.net/
Shlomo’s Glasto Diary ’09 – part 2 – DJ YODA vs VOCAL ORCHESTRA
Part two of Shlomo’s Glastonbury diary featuring a live battle between DJ YODA and SHLOMO AND THE VOCAL ORCHESTRA!
Part three is out next week!
Video by http://www.asdescribed.net/
Shlomo’s Glasto Diary ’09 – part 1 – the Vocal Orchestra
Part one of Shlomo’s Glastonbury diary featuring his beatbox choir THE VOCAL ORCHESTRA, plus JARVIS COCKER, IMOGEN HEAP, DJ YODA and MARCUS BRIGSTOCKE.
Part two is out next week!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNjL6sXwibE
Video by http://www.asdescribed.net/
my glastonbury
This year’s Glasto was one of the best yet. I ended up doing three shows and saw some incredible live music. My favourite bits were getting lost on random all night adventures and watching the sun come up over the site. We have video and podcast coming soon but in the meantime here are some pics from the weekend…. love from SHLO x
For our Saturday show on the Park Stage we had some special guests, completely unrehearsed as usual. We had a quick run-through up in the campsite because it was too noisy by the stage.
Park Stage was rammed... 10,000 people?? I've played there every year since it started three years back, really feels like home
First guest was supremely talented Imogen Heap who joined the Vocal Orchestra in an improvised circle jam
next up DJ Yoda battled the Vocal Orchestra whilst rocking some gangsta wellies
Then radio 4's Marcus Brigstocke did his best to strip Bellatrix of her crown (she recently became World Beatbox Champion). His beatbox donald duck was quite impressive but no match for her crazy "chicken drumming".
Last but not least was the legend that is Jarvis Cocker.. i can't believe i introduced him with 'his name starts with cock'.... someone shoot me
Jarvis was a last minute addition to the show after another guest had to pull out. He agreed to sing 'Fat Children' with us on condition that 3 of the vocal orchestra girls sang backing vocals for his headline set that night. Fair deal!
that night i did another show in the early hours... it was called Africa Express Soundsystem, where African musicians jammed with Europeans... it was amazing...
My highlights were dueting with Bashy, and jamming with an amazing fiddler whose solo was incredible until i accidentally stood on his lead, which pulled it out and it all ended with a painful crunch
Me and Imogen at sunrise
Sunday night was one of the biggest highlights for me... watching the prodigy headline the other stage... INCREDIBLE!
After the prodigy i got a call saying that Foreign Beggars were about to play in the Bassline Circus and did i want to jump up… it was a lot of fun being up with the beggars again as i’ve not played with them for years… then we raved out to some drum and bass in Shangri La until the sun came up and it was time to go home. Ah well only one more year till the next one!
Shlo gets 3D
Glastonbury diary – part 4
After 3 performances over the first two days of Glastonbury, Sunday was for partying.
George recording the podcast at the campsite while breakfast is cooking!
Taking a wander
Then we watched the excellent Balkan Beat Box (nothing to do with beatboxing!) on the Jazz World stage.
over to the Other Stage to watch Groove Armada’s headline slot
Flares in the crowd….
Then all night campfire!
Night time view from our campsite
Sun about to rise
Sun coming up over Park area
Whoops it’s officially the morning
It was all over too soon. Glastonbury 2008 was wicked.
Glastonbury diary – part 3
It’s 3pm. The show starts at 6. Emily Eavis has given us free reign of the Park Stage for two hours.
I’ve got the Vocal Orchestra and a heap of guest collaborators and I need to rehearse. We find a bar backstage with a decent soundsystem and get to it. Before I know it we are ready to go on, Park Stage is totally rammed!
The sun has come out and the people are smiling. Pavan from Foreign Beggars is helping me host the stage. I hear him saying my name followed by a cheer and next thing I know I am beatboxing to about 10,000 Glastonbury punters.
I kick it off with a short solo set to introduce the crowd to what I do. As I power up my looping setup, there is a loud popping noise followed by silence. I’m told that I have blown the generator for the entire Park Area. Oops. Now I am freaking out – so much work has gone into this show. This can’t be the end of it! The audience aren’t having any of it… they remain enthusiastic, singing and cheering until the power eventually comes back on. Phew!
No time to lose now, I skip straight to my drum n bass looping song to get everyone moving again, and then bring out the Vocal Orchestra. They are on fire today.
The Vocal Orchestra
What follows is a unique mish-mash of guest stars performing spontaneously. The music ranges from folk to jazz to hip hop to tabla to scratch battles to raucous sing-a-longs. If you would like to hear some of the music you will have to wait for the podcast – we did an audio diary of the whole weekend which will be out soon. There are some pics below, mostly taken by RJ Fernandez, more to come.
Martha Wainwright sang a version of ‘In the Middle of the Night’ with me on beats
Martina Topley-Bird sang ‘Police and Thieves’ by Junior Mervin with the Vocal Orchestra as backing band
DJ Yoda survived a scratch battle with Bellatrix!
Get Cape, Wear Cape, Fly performed ‘Ghost Town’ by the Specials with the Vocal Orchestra
Ed Harcourt presented me with a fake diamond encrusted golden microphone onstage… I think he wanted me to look as bling as Jay-Z! Then he sang ’50 ways to leave your lover’
Me, Ed Harcourt, Pavan and Reverend from the Makers (these pics courtesy of BBC)
The other guests were Portico Quartet, Pete Lockett and Lemn Sissay.
It was a moving experience, I came off stage exhausted but happy – I felt like all the collaborations and musical experiences from the past year as resident at Southbank have armed me with all the tools I needed to rock a two hour improvised show. It was probably the best show I’ve ever done, certainly the most fun show I have been a part of. I can’t wait to do it again. Watch this space!
Glastonbury diary – part 2
Was starving after playing Pyramid stage on Friday, so I had a ‘Glastonbury Garlic Guzzler’ (amazing burger). Wandered down to the Park Stage to see Dizzee Rascal. The highlight was Calvin Harris coming on to sing ‘Dance wiv Me’… it’s now at number 1!
Then came on Pete Doherty. He was sort of stable and seemed to be able to remember his chords and lyrics. It is a bit like listening to an old drunk in the pub way after closing time singing songs about the past.
On Saturday morning I woke up early to try out the solar-powered showers (first wash since Wednesday. Nice). Then it was over to Pyramid stage for my appearance with Martha Wainwright. Pyramid felt a bit more normal second time around.
Martha’s music is a blend of folk and country rock and pretty much the last thing the crowd was expecting was a duet with a human beatboxer.
But playing to a crowd of 40,000 people in the afternoon can’t be bad promotion for the gig that evening!
As soon as we came off stage we were ushered into a Land Rover to take us back to the Park Stage to start rehearsing for the show that evening.
Glastonbury diary – part 1
We got to the festival on Thursday evening and set up camp in the Park area. In the past I have camped in the ‘public’ camping areas to be with my friends, but last year I had such a crazy time (my tour manager was taken ill the night before so I was dragging my gear through the mud in a complete daze) so this year I opted for the artist campsite!
SO day one, Friday, and I woke up knowing that today I was going to achieve one of my personal ambitions – to play the Pyramid Stage. I vowed I would do this when I first came to the festival in 2005. I had been invited to do a guest spot with singer songwriter Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly. I had no idea what we were going to do.
The crowd that had gathered to watch the set was massive. I’m talking make your whole body tingle every time they cheer massive.
The view from onstage as I watched the first half of the show was incredible. I start to feel a massive release of adrenaline…
In a flash it is all over. I have played the Pyramid!
Off to Glastonbury
OK. I’m all packed. Got my boots and wet wipes. I’m not sure what to expect weather-wise but I’m prepared for the worst! I’ve camped at Glastonbury for the last two festivals, got drenched, but still loved it.
Me at Glasto last year
Been rehearsing all day at Southbank with a whole selection of artists who will be joining me on Park Stage on Saturday evening. I had Nitin Sawhney down today jamming with Pete Lockett on tabla and Orifice from Foreign Beggars rapping. Also had Ed Harcourt down as well as Portico Quartet. Those guys and MANY MORE will all be collaborating and performing on our stage at Glasto!
I’m also playing two guest slots on the Pyramid Stage this year.. on Friday with Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly and on Saturday with Martha Wainwright.
SO see you on the other side. Wish me luck!!
Win 2 tickets to Glastonbury!
Hi, Shlo here. So you might know we are hosting our own stage for the Saturday evening at the Glastonbury Park Stage this year. The idea is that my beatbox choir (Shlomo and the Vocal Orchestra) will be the backing band for a series of guest-star collaborations.
Emily Eavis is curating the Park Stage and she has invited several of the festival’s key artists to collaborate with us.
The lineup is a secret but you can probably guess some of the names by looking at previous Unconventional Means lineups, then throw in a few of this year’s headline artists and you have yourself a show!
If you can guess the artists referred to in the following clues, email your name, phone number and answers to competition@shlo.co.uk by 5pm on Friday 20th June and you will be in with a chance of winning two free tickets to the festival.
1. Locating superhero attire
2. Preacher with creators
3. Two offspring of folk-rock dynasties
