Whistler Vancouver 2010 Olympics Day 2

Another big day here in Whistler, as far as free live events happening along the Village stroll.

The day started a bit latter than usual due to the Mens DH Skiing being moved to Monday because of the 20cm we had over night.

I started off the day watching Valerie Sajdik and her band perform live on stage in the village square.

Valerie is a very bi-lingual singer speaking German, French, English and Russian. Valerie has a well established career signing her first record deal at the age of 14. At the age of 18 she started to study law while taking singing classes at the Music Conservatory in Vienna. A few years later she was signed onto an Austria group called C-bra and they topped the chart twice on the Austrian Airplay Charts. In 2000 Valerie split from C-bra and started collaborating with some french musicians.

In 2005 Valerie makes it big with a summer hit “Tous les jours” which hit the radio stations in both Austria and Germany and her album Riviera was well received in both countries as well as gaining much attention in Europe and the United States.

A year later Valerie signs with Sony BMG Austria and receives many awards including “Amadeus Award” which is Austria’s music prize for best national singer of the year. Valerie has been recently spending a lot of time in her studio in France recording her new album which is release in March 2010.

It was fun to watch Valerie perform on stage, she was a very animated person on stage with a very up beat and alive show. I can tell why she’s come so far in the past 18 years of her career.

After the live performance of Valerie Sajdik I walked down the village stroll to take some photos of all the people that have come to see the Olympic festivities happening here in Whistler.

Not far down the Village stroll I found a group of drummers performing for a large group of people. I snapped a few photo’s and continued on down the stroll when I ran into the Transe-Express so I switched lenses.

Before I knew it the other drum line that I saw previously had caught up and crossed paths with the Transe-Express. This turned into what appeared to be a little bit of a drum battle between the two  drum lines. It was very fun to see and they even got the crowd involved.

After seeing an amazing performance from the Transe-Express drum line I was able to walk back up the the Village square and catch the beginning of Elliot Brood one of many free live shows that are happening daily during the 16 days of the Olympic Games.

Elliot Brood was a fun act to watch with their unique sound and their two very passionate guitar players Mark Sasso and Casey Laforet along with their excellent drummer Stephen Pitkin.

Mark Sasso and Casey Laforet grew up together in Windsor Ontario and started playing as a band when they moved to Toronto after High school. Mark and Casey started off playing gig’s with two other musicians who eventually dropped out after a few shows.

The two continued on as a duo until they hooked up with producer Stephen Pitkin to record their first album Tin Type which was released in 2004. Stephen recorded and co-produced Tin Type but was not an official member until the band released their first LP Ambassador on Six Shooter Records in 2005.

Shortly after Elliott Broods set there was a some broadcasting of the Men’s Luge on the Whistler Live Screens in the Village square before the Great Lake Swimmers hit the stage.

The Great Lake Swimmers put on a great show with their full band filled with everything from the banjo, harmonica, violin to a stand up bass along with all the usual’s drums, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, keyboard. Not to mention the beautiful vocals of Julie Fader and the unforgettable voice of Tony Dekker.

The band is another excellent Canadian band on the line up for the Olympic stage. They are originally from Wainfleet, Ontario but they are currently located out of Toronto. The band has gained much acclaim in Canada with their fourth album “Lost Channels” which is played on CBC Radio 3 and has topped the charts at #1 on Amazons MP3 download charts.

The Swimmers really put on an exciting show with some passionate Violin by Julie Fader and some very classic stand up bass by Bret Higgins. The Great Lake Swimmers where the last free show of the night but a great way to end the second day of the Whistler Vancouver 2010 Olympics.

If you haven’t read my Whistler Vancouver 2010 Olympic Day 1 blog posting with Stan Matwychuk and the Hair Farmers you can check that out here.