Hi guys,
Felt a little like the 4th of July as well up here in Montreal tonight! Though cool, I still had a fairly enjoyable night, especially with the fireworks display being so beautiful and dazzling.
Firstly, I just wanted to know if the smoke did in fact frequently blow towards many of those positioned at La Ronde? I’m asking because winds maintained their Westerly status (occasional North Northwesterlies) throughout the evening and eventually died down somewhat to the speeds I had posted (9-16 km/h) – they were recorded at variable speeds between 14-17 km/h at 10:00 p.m. with occasional brief sudden breezes. From Notre-Dame, my cousin and I sometimes looked towards the park during the display and it looked as if it were covered in a dense fog, so this was some indication of wind tendency. Temperature (16 C) and humidity levels also followed closely to what was stated earlier, as were the partly cloudy skies. The only thing that deviated from what I expected was that the winds had taken slightly longer to diminish during the evening.
Turning my attention to Australia’s display, based on my vantage point on Notre-Dame, aside from the slightly early start, the display got off to a fairly active start during the first song I thought that this was a beautiful performance and, much like Spain and England, had some awesome sequences towards low level, though in their own respective way. We were treated with a wide variety of effects, including shells of go-getters, shells of crackling pistils, shells of multibreaks, bow shells, horsetails, photoflashes (though I was expecting more of these), farfalles, fountains, mines, screaming serpents, shells of screaming serpents, candles, cakes, huge chest-thumping shells towards mid to high level and plenty of z-cake variations.
Synchronization was really nicely done throughout the entire show and I thought the fireworks almost always flowed very well with the selected soundtrack, especially at low level with the z-cakes and mines from right to left and vice versa – this was very artistic and creative in the various ways that were implemented. The music connection also made the display very enjoyable since things were virtually right on cue. The music choice, for the most part, was appropriate and enjoyable.
The finale was simply powerful, at sufficient length, colorful and had good crescendo! However, it just finished off just a little too abruptly without a sufficient final bang with the usual volley(s) of thundering salutes at the very end. Still, though, this finale was fantastic and enjoyable and was similar, if not somewhat better than their 2006 finale. Good stuff. What a way to conclude after an overall wonderful performance!
To close, I thought that this was a successful and very enjoyable display, which never lost its symmetry from top to bottom and left to right despite how active and broad the display was at times. The sequences at low level with the candles, mines, comets and particularly z-cakes, to me, offered some of the most important and critical aspects of the show, merely because the timing came with such precision. Some of my personal favorite parts were during the Xanadu and Nella Fantasia, One Vision and Magic segments. The quality of the pieces was fairly good, and I thought the multibreaks and farfalles were simply stunning, especially those with the green stars mixed in. The horsetails were also very delicate and most admirable when present – a good depiction of one of the slower parts of the show. The music was well introduced for each segment, with one song flowing into the other in good harmony without many delays. The music choice itself was carefully considered for this sort of theme, “Dream Catcher”, but I felt that maybe three of the selections didn’t quite do it justice in terms of feel or just overall representation and relevance to the theme. Also, though synchronization was very well done, I found that, much like during England’s display, a number of segments would end a little too abruptly without a sufficient finish in accordance with the music concluding. In addition, many parts of the show became a little repetitive with firing patterns towards mid to high level with the various shells being fired. The smaller shells towards low level often forming a sort of rainbow-like pattern also sometimes became a little redundant. Finally, I felt that there were times where the rates of firing between segments were somewhat identical, so I didn’t occasionally quite grasp the transitional points as I was expecting to.
The colors were clearly diverse, dazzling and, occasionally bright - I was particularly fond of the light pink and deep purple stars that were seen at a couple of points. The effects were carefully implemented to support much of the soundtrack that was used by reflecting upon certain key aspects of those tracks, such as the heart shells during “When You Wish Upon A Star” or shells of strobes in combination with star-shaped shells during “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star”. The theme itself seemed to have been well represented throughout the display, and I believe that much of the soundtrack indeed served to portray the key components of the theme that Foti wanted to present in their performance to begin with. Many of the effects were quite beautiful, especially when in combination. I also didn’t notice as many nautical shells as what was mentioned – they probably were sometimes hidden behind the smoke, or I just simply overlooked most of them altogether (I did notice a point where there were nautical strobes, though). Aside from a few music choices, the display, in general, wasn’t too deviant, and so things remained on track with good fluidity in terms of pace. However, at times I felt that the display didn’t have much of a thematic direction to work with since the components depicting the theme weren’t always grouped together on the music list. Therefore, I felt the display could have benefited from a little bit more organization (especially compared to England’s display) with respect to its critical points, just so to keep things in better perspective. As for the finale, I really loved it, though it could have ended with a nice thundering close after all the chaos!
All that said, this was a wonderful and mystical display that often possessed a magical feel to it – I believe this was the intention on team Australia’s part. In general, the show was enjoyed by the vast majority of individuals tonight, including yours truly. Foti put on a fabulous performance, and although I liked their 2006 display a touch more, this show was well delivered in many regards, most notably, again, with respect to the low level sequencing. Despite my criticisms, my personal rating for this display is not too far from England’s show, but I really liked Australia’s simply because of the overall balance, liveliness, vibrancy and design of the display, particularly at low level.
As mentioned in the weather thread, we're looking at generally much better weather this week.
EDIT: Paul, could you please edit the title and add "Australia - Foti's International Fireworks reviews"? I pressed enter before I could finish.
Thanks!
Trav.
