Itty-Bitty tees at Ofelia Market!

Ahoi! May I please direct your attention to the fact that this coming weekend you can buy our t-shirts at Ofelia Market, the burlesque-, goth-, lolita-, retro-, vintage- and rock´n´roll-inspired arts and crafts fair/second hand market! I will be there in the lobby, table 37, with my own Paprika! products, and sell our t-shirts for anyone interested alongside. :) Come and say hi!

NORTH / SOUTH

The Bitties are exceptionally busy this weekend! And we´re stretched wiiiiide over the map at the moment.

Cherry, Jackie and Lola will be charming the hearts of the people in Kalajoki - that´s way up north from our usual hoods, you know - here!

And in the meantime, I´ll be covering the south and travelling to Tallinn, Estonia, to perform here tonight (scroll down to the bottom of the page) and here tomorrow, both gigs with the amazing HulaPirates Kabaree!




Beware, people of north and people of south. We´re preparing to win over your hearts with our shimmylicious ways.

A GHOST STORY

Once upon a time there were three girls... but that´s all we know about their story. Sadly. These days they are no more than wraiths or spirits, a touch a cobweb, a cold breeze; that is, ghosts. Will you let us haunt you, pretty please?

... or you can make up your own story, on basis of the following images:









The scary-but-oh-so-sweet Jackie O´Lantern:



The dead-but-delicious Tinker Bell:



The eerie-and-elegant Vera De Vil:




Photography credits go to © Marko Saari. Liina Junna is to blame for making us pretty, that is, she´s responsible for the hair and the make-up.

OUR CALENDAR : DECEMBER

(Yes, but Christmas is supposed to be tacky isn't it? :)

Saturday 4th:
Blues Trash Cabaret @ On the Rocks with BOB LOG III

Tuesday 7th:
The Itty-Bitty Tease Beginner's burlesque class starting!
It is fully booked, but keep your pretty eyes and small little ears open for when we announce the next one!

Saturday 11th:
Cherry at Devil's Lounge @ Dog's Home, Tampere

We'll keep the calendar updated with changes and possible new venues, but we are hoping to be able to relax during the holidays too...

BITTIES TAKING OVER THE WORLD - STEP 1

Fabulous illustrator Marie Meier form France wearing the Itty-Bitty Tease tee!

Do you have a picture of yourself in the tee? We'd love to admire it so send it over if you so wish :)

ITTY-BTTY INTERVIEW

You can read an interview with us Bitties in the Novebmer issue of Kotilääkäri magazine :)

PSYCHORAMA VIDEO ACTION

There´s some Tinker Bell boob-shaking tassel-twirling action in there amidst all the rock´n´roll. :D

OUR CALENDAR : NOVEMBER

Wedesday 3rd
Glitter Grill goes Cold War @ Ravintola Wäiski
For more info, check the post below! That's tonight folks, don't miss this!

Friday 5th
Pro bono twirling for charity : Cherry & Vera at Kalevankadun Nenäpäivä @ Base
Also performing are the Finnish Blonde Burlesque Troupe!
For more info visit kalevankatu.fi

Saturday 6th
Tinker Bell performing at SMFR Halloween + Tuntematonmaa.net 10v @ Ravintola Wäiski

Friday 19th
TInker Bell & Cherry dee performing at the Bomber-party @ On The Rocks

Saturday 27th
Lola, Jackie and Cherry head up north to perform at Ravintola Dyyni in Kalajoki!

SUnday 28th
Tinker Bell heading over to Tallinn with the Hula Pirates to perform at Feministid Tulevad Kell Kolm!

GLITTER GRILL GOES COLD WAR

Tomorrow it´s Wednesday and tomorrow it´s time for this year´s last Glitter Grill! And ooo boy it´s a special one, this. First and foremost, it´s happening at Ravintolalaiva Wäiski - a bigger venue, and with plenty of performers there, all spiced up with the one and only Twirly Girl, Indigo Blue! Methinks the cold war theme will bring you especially interesting shows from all performers. And of course, the Bitties will be there as well, both with group and solo numbers. So do come! Tickets will be 12 € at the door.

THEATRICAL EYE-CANDY

Jackie already gave you a teaser of what happened at Bittyfest, but since I´m having a stupid flu and can´t sleep (that´s what you get from sleeping too little and happily tripping around Stockholm city wearing highly impractical stuff - that, and sore feet) I decided to go more into detail about the show in particular and most importantly give you folks some pics of what happened on stage there!

The place being a theatrical venue, we of course wanted to make the show itself something more alike a theatre performance rather than the usual burly club night - so we had it planned in two acts, and with an intermission in between when people could buy drinks, enjoy the DJ´s sounds and generally chitchat with each other and have a good time, having had to sit down on their behinds for half an hour in the half-darkness. It all worked surprisingly well and we were delighted! Myself being a scenographer in my spare time (it used to be the other way round... heh.), I might have wanted to make it look even more like a theatrical performance, you know, with a proper set and all that jazz - but then again it wasn´t exactly needed the way we did it now, so why stress. (Next time though, ooh... be prepared. ;D) With our very skilled and lovely lighting designer we managed to bring out the best of the space with as little hassle as possible, and we had extra-super-duper-special projections in between the shows to illustrate the time and place - for you know, it was a historical journey through time, and as such had to be illustrated with something else than only T&A...


The public was guided and lectured by the always impeccable Bettie Blackheart. Wouldn´t we all have liked school a little more, had we such teachers back in the day?




Well, as all of you who attended already know, burlesque was obviously invented back in the stone age. A pre-historical top fell off, lots of twirling followed, and nothing was ever the same!




That´s when Cherry entered the stage as Lucie and thus gave a kick start to the party:




After that we were taken to the cold and dark tombs of ancient Egypt. Well. Mummies are not always what they seem, though. Ask me, I´ll tell you.




... then we just skipped over Greece and Rome because frankly togas are so boring, and the Middle Ages were just so dark and we like to smell good, and all in all we´d just been there for three days and nights if a little time warp hadn´t been in place. So next the public was introduced to Lola´s Detective hunting for clues (when all the Bitties´ jewelry had been stolen and we were all poor and suffering and awww). Sure perks up any old dusty detective office, that girl, I´d say.




Well, of course she got our belongings back and then we became Big In Japan.




Then it was time for the interval, and for us to catch our breath a little and prepare for the second act. Apart from Bettie B., we were greatly aided by the presence of our three marvellous stage hands/space sailors/pick-up boys -



- The Captain, Mela Lugosi and Mr. Eddi, in their respective order.


Time for Act 2! Now again as all those know who were there, the story has a darker turn, where the Bitties start thinking way too much of themselves and end up in quarrels and fights, and the group splits. So sad. Cherry changes her name to La Cereza Negra and becomes the terror of any texmex sheriffs and outlaws alike.




Meanwhile by the Carelian lakes and deep forests, beautiful Vera breaks the hearts of poor local blokes with her Slavonic seductress skills.




Meanwhile in Paris in the 1960´s, Tinker and Lola try their hand at something more experimental.




Meanwhile in Vietnam, Jackie thinks that if there´s no point in anything, she might just as well fight and die. Well, we´re in the swingin´ sixties alright, so instead she shimmies away and burns her bra, but that´s just to be expected. We´re none of us very prone for fights, not really.




Enter the future and space-age! The Bitties meet at an airport, throw away their grudges and engage in a joyful space-a-go-go instead. How neat!





... only ever so slightly psychedelic, ehh.


And here´s the whole happy bittycrew at curtain call, finally:





All pics here are by Laura Kansanen-Stavale and Rik Stavale, whose photo exhibition of burlesque pics was also to be seen during Bittyfest at the theatre. We´re so grateful to you folks, you rock. Hearts.


Wheeee it was fun! And exhausting, so give us a little breathing space, soon we´ll forget all about the exhausting part and only remember how great it was to perform, and probably start planning and plotting for Bittyfest number two. There are slight chances, though, that you still might see this version somewhere, sometime, that would be fun, but we´ll have to look into that later, everything´s been so busybusybusy later. Stockholm last weekend and Glitter Grill (with the one and only Indigo Blue performing too!!!) tomorrow already, and all such fun coming up... if anyone wants to volunteer as a secretary for us, we guarantee a busy and sequin-filled time ahead. ;D

IBTC 4EVA

We had fun at the Stockholm Burlesque festival! We decided to take knuckle tattoos to commemorate this historical event: IBTC 4EVA for everyone of us. Well, not really since we're bunch of sissies, it's just magic marker this time. 4/5 of us Bitties have tattoos, so who knows if someone of us will actually take a IBTC tattoo someday?

The event was held at Berns Salonger, and the place was very beautiful with stunning chandeliers and fancy gold ornaments and creepy old dudes painted in the walls. We didn't see all of the performances, but some of them at least! Miss Indigo Blue twirled like crazy, and Velma Voluptous looked gorgeus and sang amazingly. We also liked a lot the opening performance by Ivoncita and Her Matadores De Amor. They had a catchy song, a good coreography and they seemed to have fun Thanks for The Amazing Knicker Kittens Burlesque Revue for organizing this event, hope it's the first of many!

Over the Ocean

Next weekend the Itty-Bitties will be taking their fancy purple sailboat and traveling across the ocean! (Yeah right... actually we'll take the normal Helsinki-Stockholm cruise ship where you can sleep in bunk beds and buy tax-free booze.) We'll be performing at the Stockholm Burlesque Festival! We are performing on Friday 29th. There are loads of performes, but they have saved the best for the last, us! Hopefully we'll have time to see some of the other performers in their shimmy-twirly-shake-action, not just in the backstage.

After the Bittyfest

The Bittyfest was a succes! The event was sold out and everthing went really well. The audience was really nice, thank you all who attended! After the fest we have been taking it easy for one week, but now we're back in action.

Here's Vera and Lola, picture from the Bittyfest by Laura Kansanen-Stavale.

BITTY-SHIRTS HAVE ARRIVED!

The lovely, soft, comfy bitty-shirts have arrived and we have a box full of them at Bittycave, ready to be shipped out to whomever wants one - or many! They come in lady fit and unisex fit so have your pick, but be quick (ha- that rhymes. Accidental poems rule.), there are not too many of them. We´ll be selling them at Bittyfest next week´s Saturn-day, so if you´re coming and want to be certain of getting your shirt you can of course comment here and make reservations. You can also get them at Kallion Suutari on Fleminginkatu! And we´ll of course mail them out to you if you wish. The price is 13 € plus postage to wherever you´re currently residing.

The ladies fit, seen as below:





And here´s the unisex/men´s fit:

BITTYFEST!

We have been practising a lot lately for the world's first Bittyfest! The Universal Premiere of the Bittyfest is next Saturday 16.10, and we are slightly nervous, but mostly very, very exited. At the festival the Bitties are timetraveling from the stone age to the future, from Africa to the Moon! We got some old numbers as well as brand new ones, some solos as well as group numbers. You'll also Laura Kansanen-Stavale's and Rik Stavale's burlesque themed photo exhibition during the break!

You can get the tickets to the event from Tiketti.



The event takes place at the small and cozy Kokoteatteri theater.


We were lucky to get the gorgeous Bettie Blackheart to host the show!

OUR CALENDAR : OCTOBER

Gigs & Events for October 2010:

Friday 1st

Performing at Le Bonk with The Urban Voodoo Machine and Lady Ane Angel form the UK and miss Lalla Morte from France.
Ticket from Tiketti. Don't miss this!
(ps. did you spot Missy and the Baron in the video? :)


Saturday 9th
Blues Trash Cabaret at On The Rocks, together with the bands Mystery Gang (from Hungary) and Rockin'Blue Collars.


Saturday 16th, the one and only:
Hold your horses! Book your calendars! See you there! Our very own Bittyfest!
Tickets available from Tiketti, and more info on this to come.


Tuesday 26th
Our in-no-time-fully-booked Burlesque Beginners Class start!


Friday 29th
Performing at the Stockholm Burlesque Festival at Berns Salonger.

PSYCHORAMA IN PICTURES

The Psychorama 2010 Festival was a blast!

The festival was hosted by Baawo the Baron. We performed with marvellous mr. Bent Van Der Bleu, magnificent miss Brion Bonaventura and totally awesome Missy Macabre. She was so sweet and so scary!!! She performed a beautiful fan dance on Friday, and made everyone think she's a lovely cutie-pie. But on Saturday she was jumping on broken glass and playing with fire and all kinds of creepy but cool sideshow action. It was great to meet Missy, she seemed like a really nice person! Here's Missy and Brion:


And here are pictures of us Itty-Bitties: Cherry Dee as the 50ft woman, Tinker Bell as the Living Dead Girl and Jackie O'Lanten casting a spell. The pictures are by Laura Kansanen-Stavale, Rik Stavale and Saara Salmi. If you want to see some more photos of Psychorama, here's some by Marko Hämäläinen: public.fotki.com/RonnieDee/2010/psychorama-2010

PSYCHORAMA 2010

Only two days until Psychorama Festival 2010!


The second Psychorama festival in a row, this year´s party will begin on Friday 10th and end in (very early) Sunday morning, so you´re treated to a whole two days of psychobilly and burlesque delights at Korjaamo. So come all and bring all your friends! There are some rather spectacular acts to see and hear. :)



There´s more info here!


Your resident Bitties will be zombies, living dead girls, volcanos, witches and ghosts, to suit the theme!
And that´s not all; you´ll also see amazing burlesque acts from Brion Bonaventura, Bent Van Der Bleu, Missy Macabre & The Baron!


Some pics from last year´s Psychorama:



Olivia Rouge




Sally Vanilla




Cherry Dee Licious


And as for the precise program of this year:


Friday 10th of September 2010 (19-04)

- DJ's Toukka & Kuuma blondi!

20:00 THE VERTICALS (FI)
21:00 PATSY WALKERS (FI)
22:00 BURLESQUE ACTION:
Bent Van Der Bleu, Jackie O'Lantern, Cherry Dee Licious
22:15 THE ARKHAMS (US)
23:30 BURLESQUE ACTION:
Tinker Bell, Missy Macabre (UK), The Itty-Bitty Tease Cabaret
23:45 THE PEACOCKS (CH)
01:15 THE POLECATS (UK)


Saturday 11th of September (19-04)

- DJ Kuuma blondi!

20:00 THE COUNTRY DARK (FI)
21:00 VULTURE CLUB (FI)
22:00 BURLESQUE ACTION:
Brion Bonaventura, Jackie O'Lantern, Missy Macabre (UK)
22:15 GRAVEYARD JOHNNYS (UK)
23:30 BURLESQUE ACTION:
The Itty-Bitty Tease Cabaret, Missy Macabre (UK)
23:45 THE COFFINSHAKERS (SE)
01:15 GORILLA (HU)



TICKETS:
2 day tickets: 45 EUR
1 day tickets (Friday or Saturday): 27 EUR

Advance tickets available at:
Tiketti
Lippupiste

OUR CALENDAR : SEPTEMBER

Summer is over, fall is here, we are keeping busy as usual!

First of all, our site is now up and running!
Check it out : www.ittybittytease.com

Second, our limited edition T-shirts will be available soon!
Keep up with the news trough our Facebook-group or start following this blog right here, right now :)

And then onwards to the shows; here is our schedule for September:

Friday 10th & 11th

The second annual Psychorama Psychobilly & Burlesque Festival!
The event takes place at Korjaamo , stay tuned for more info on that soonish.


Saturday September 18th


The week thereafter we will perform at the Helsinki Vintage Warm Up Club at Belly along with Sweet Jeena & Her Sweethearts.


Thursday 23rd
Cherry Dee and Jackie O'Lantern will grab Hula Pirate's Sally Vanilla along and do a show for Maailman Matkailupäivä.

Updates will be added if needed.

WORKSHOPS

Burlesque workshops seem to be the desire and the demand of people these days, so us Bitties gladly obey and keep ourselves busy not only by performances, but also by arranging burlesque workshops for beginners. The spring and summer of 2010 have been especially busy workshop-wise; mostly it´s hen nights, with bunches of giddy girls happy to learn the noble art of shimmying and shaking, but we´re especially proud to announce that our first long (around 10 lessons!) burlesque beginners´ course is about to start in late October! The course was full in no time and we´re sooo thrilled and excited about planning it at the moment. If it´s a success there may very well be something similar in spring - but let´s not get ahead of ourselves just yet. ;)


However, in the meantime and on demand, we´ll keep on doing these short workshops as well. Today I ventured to Kotka, a nice-seeming town some 130 km east of Helsinki, to hold a workshop for some fifteen lovely ladies. And oh, we had such fun.





Just behold my shining pupils, all decked out and striking a pose! Aren´t they the cutest.





We had the luxury to dance in a theatre location this time, but the workshops work fairly well in your average living room, too. And the longer course will be held at our lovely pink-walled Bittycave, the headquarters of everything bittylicious and glittery. Feel free to contact us if you´d like to try your wings at the secrets of bump´n´grind!

WE WERE THE ART THAT WENT TO KAPAKKA

Bitty-sheikkausta Bottalla (Ylen Aamu-TV:n koosteessa) Art Goes Kapakka-festareilla 26. elokuuta 2010. Reippaat ja raikkaat viitisen minuuttia asiaohjelman keskellä, noin kohdassa 0:25-0:30 minuuttia. :)

LOLA AND THE GRAVEMEN / BLUES TRASH CABARET

The Gravemen : Let's Dance. Shot at the Blues Trash Cabaret club at bar Loose in June this year. You can see bits of Lola's shaking her behind in her Big Bottoms number!

We perform regularly at the Blues trash Cabaret-club. The monthly club started were Club Wanted, Finland's first -and only- monthly burlesque club ended. Were Wanted focused on rockabilly and burlesque, BTC gives a wider range of interesting music -past performers have been such as Reverend Beat Man, Hola Ghost and Dead Elvis. And it's not your everyday portion of burlesque offered either!

The club started out in Lepakkomies and then moved on to Bar Loose. From August on until the end of the year the venue will take place at On The Rocks. As said, we perform as the "in-house burlesque group", but at September's gig we'll let Missy Macabre take over the stage.

Blues Trash Cabaret is the first Saturday of every month.

ART GOES KAPAKKA

THere are still a few days left of the Helsinki City Festival Art Goes Kapakka, and we will once again contribute and add a little sparkle to it. To be more exact: tomorrow night, Thursday August 26th, at Manala! Our show will be at 00:30. Before that you can see drag artist Pola Ivanka perform with her band.

The video of our performance above was shot at last year's AGK.