As the final last few days zip by, many are wondering who VANOC (Vancouver Olympics organizing committee) has chosen to perform for the opening ceremonies. Canada fortunately has quite a few talented artists to choose from in this category. Although it's considered the second largest country in the world, the population is a mere 33 million, just a bit more than half of England's population. Who will perform? Canadians in the pool to pick from...
Leslie Feist, Shania Twain, Avril Lavigne, Celine Dion, Nickelback, Michael Bublé, Brian adams, Nelly Furtado, K-os, Diana Krall, Chantal Kreviazuk, Ron Sexsmith, K.D. Lang, Alanis Morissette, Tegan and Sara, Arcade Fire, and even Howard Shore, the list goes on and on.
You just hope they don't piss off any of the talent beforehand...
The Vancouver Symphony Orchestra joined Cirque du Soleil as a world class performing group turning their back on the Olympics. Told that they would have to mime their performance with prerecorded music, the symphony's conductor, Bramwell Tovey decided to opt out of the big event.
"I felt it was dishonest. I thought it was fraudulent," Tovey told the newspaper. (Globe and Mail)
"It's promoted with public money, and I didn't want anything to do with this kind of dishonest practice."
Unfortunately this wasn't the first butting of heads... they furthered the ire of the music community by giving singer-songwriter Nicole Scoffield an agreement that required Scoffield to sign away all her rights to the song if she wanted it used during the games. Perhaps that doesn't sound out of place but considering that they hadn't even looked at her composition yet that seems rather harsh.
