The First International Queerlesque Festival @ Savoy Theater

Hei guys! This is it, last chance to see me on stage this year! Feeling beyond excited to join the spectacular cast of the First International Queerlesque Festival in Helsinki! Betty Fvck has curated a delicious blend of burlesque, drag, circus and much more! The evening will include two different shows, so you're welcome to join us for one of both of them! Find the full performer list and all the necessary information in facebook, and head to tiketti.fi to buy your tickets! See you! 😉💛💛

Kuuton Klubi

Well hello again! I had a TOTAL BLAST last Saturday at The Ravishing Shangri-La Rubies' Halloween club, Kuuton Klubi! The lineup was delicious, and I had the great pleasure of relaxing and watching the second and third sets in good company since I was last in the first set. Letting my clumsy-crazy-juggler-clown out to play is always so much fun! 😁

Also, did you know that the Rubies-klubit have a team of top professionals just to take care of their life-stream? You've never seen a live-stream in so good quality, I promise! And the best thing is that even if you missed it, it is still available to be watched online until Saturday. Just follow this link to buy your access! 💛

And here go a couple of pictures of my being silly and having fun on stage, see you next time! 

Picture by Jari Flinck

Picture by Jari Flinck

Kaamos Kabaree in Oulu

 Aaaahhh, what a weekend (and week!)! This week started with some surprising (very positive and a bit unexpected) news that concern my other profession (object conservation), so I haven't been able to post about this on time, but I was utterly delighted to be part of this year's Kaamos Kabaree in Oulu, which is organized by my dear friend Lala L'More! It's been a couple of year's since I've last performed in Oulu (or visited altogether), and I really loved spending a weekend full of burlesque, laughter and friendship with you all 💛

I also got to teach a couple of workshops on floorwork and 1920s makeup to some wonderful people, and while my schedule was so tight that we didn't have time to take any photos before/after the workshops I can at least share this picture of the curtain call the night before! 

Picture by Jaakko Alatalo

Heldeke! Burlesk this weekend!

Hitting the stage of one of my most favourite venues this Thursday, Friday and Saturday, Heldeke! I can't even begin to tell you how excited I am about visiting my dear Tallinn and seeing some of my dearest people again. Living in Helsinki it is often easier (and cheaper!) to travel to Tallinn than many other cities in Finland, and I'm never lacking reasons to visit. This year has been rather different though, because of the C-word, and many of the events I usually look forward to had to be cancelled. 

Luckily enough travelling between Finland and Estonia is safe enough at the moment (and yes, I'm definitely keeping my mask on during the trip!) and I'll have the utter pleasure of performing for the Estonian audience (and eating all the Estonian food!) once more 💛

The venue is running on 50% capacity in order to keep it safe for everybody, which means that is you want to book yourself a ticket you should act SOON! Follow this link for more information! 

Back on stage after Corona!!!

WHAT A WEEK!!! I've hardly even had time to sit down (mostly because the one and a half free days I had I spent in very good company with dear friends 💛 ), but it couldn't have been more fabulous! I got to attend my very first “traditional” burlesque shows since corona (on Friday as part of the audience and on Saturday on stage) and it made me fell in love with burlesque all over again! I'd like to thank everybody who's made this week so special (I know I failed to tag everybody, I apologise in advance!), you make it all worth it! And I'll be looking forward to more adventures in just a couple of weeks, stay tuned for more info! 😉😍

Picture by Jari B. Miettinen

Finnish forest wonderland

 While I still haven't been able to finish updating the website, I will try to keep the blog part more active from now on! So here you go a picture of a wonderful photoshoot I had with Asko Jonathan Photography a couple of weeks ago in the forest. Moss makes a very comfortable bed, and the pictures were worth every single mosquito bite I got! Stay tuned for more pictures! 😊

Picture by Asko Jonathan Photography

Déjà vu!

 Oh hello again! Long time no write... and back after two years? Kind of sounds familiar... 😅

Well, it seems that being a full time student while juggling three other jobs on top was indeed as much as I could handle, and I haven't really touched this space during my studies. The good news is, I've now graduated and I'm back in the game! Of course I'm still a busy bee (which creative soul isn't?) and it may take me some time to fully update this blog, but I'll try to start by updating the gigs section and sharing the upcoming gigs (that I am already allowed to share). Because guess what! I'm finally hitting a burlesque stage again for the very first time after Corona! Which will also be the very first time for me performing in Hämeenlinna! 

If you're interested, follow this link to find out more about the Misty Extravaganza Night, I CAN'T WAIT TO ENTERTAIN YOU ALL AGAIN! 😍

Tampere Burlesque Experience

Looong time no write! I know, it's been almost two years since my last post and it was absolutely about time. As usual, life got in the way again and I've been way too overwhelmed to spend too much time online. The main reason for it is that I am a student again, and I'm studying for my dreamjob, but that also means I am now a full time student. And since I still keep on teaching my evening dance classes, and I have even more groups than before, there are many weeks in which my only free days is Sunday :-)
(In case you're curious, I'm studying to be a conservator of historical objects)

Anyway, I just updates the past and upcoming gigs, so I'll be looking forward to seeing many of you soon!

An speaking of which, the next chance to see me on stage will be this weekend, at the Tampere Burlesque Experience! It's been ages since I last performed in Tampere, and I couldn't possibly be any more excited about it. Olivia Rouge and Tampere Burlesque have organized such a treat for you! Teerenpeli Tease - Experience on Friday, main show on Saturday and lovely brunch on Sunday! Besides all the workshops the supertalented international guests will be teaching throughout the weekend.

You'll be able to catch me on Friday at Teerenpeli with my dear partner in crime Gigi Praline, and also performing solo on Saturday at the main event. Check out the lineup! You really don't want to miss this! <3

Love,

Pepper

Amsterdam Burlesque Awards in November!

And I can finally announce this! I'm so excited and honoured to be performing at the 3rd Amsterdam Burlesque Award this autumn! I had a great time two years ago when we performed there with Thee Dizzy Daisies, and to make things even better I will be to see a few dear friends again! <3 <3 <3
Aaaand I'll be bringing my "Algae" seaweed fandance to a festival abroad for the very first time, planning to pimp up the fans to celebrate! :-)

Hot In HELLsinki-Burlesque Spring Partee!!

And even more exciting things happening in May! I can now also announce I will be performing at the Spring event in Helsinki, which is hotter than ever so this year it's been renamed Hot In HELLsinki-Burlesque Spring Partee!
Besides your trully you'll be able to find some of Finland's hottest performers, together with the "Dark Prince of Burlesque" Raven (all the way from Berlin/Australia!) and gorgeous Italian beauty Nuit Blanche.

More info and tickets from the facebook event!

Kitten N'Lou at Pirate Pleasures!

So I can finally announce this, current 21st Century Burlesque NUMBER ONE performers Kitten N'Lou are coming back to Finland in May! And you now have the amazing opportunity to watch them live in the small, cozy and intimate club that is Pirate Pleasures, the monthly club organized by our own Queen of Fire Tassels, Bettie Blackheart.

The theme this time will be "Leather and Lace", and I will get to share the stage with not only Kitten N'Lou but also a whole bunch of wonderful Finnish performers! More than half of the tickets are already gone, so in case you don't want to miss this you better book yours asap ;-)
More information can be found from the event's facebook page.

Announcement: Berlin Burlesque Week 2016!

And some good news! I can finally announce that I will be performing at the Berlin Burlesque Week 2016! I'm absolutely over the moon about this, I have never been to Berlin before and I can't imagine a better excuse to visit the city than performing at this event with all the other amazing performers! Catch me at the Carrousel Ooh La Laa (Wednesday, May 4th) and the Sunday Soirée (Sunday, May 8th) <3

Original picture by Atelieri O. Haapala
Headpiece by Fiona Timantti Millinery

Dancing Phalanges workshop in Turku this Saturday

I'm having the honour of coming to teach at Kiki Hawaiji's Pinapple Paradise in Turku this Saturday! I will be teaching a workshop on advanced arm techniques (suitable for all levels) in which we will learn how to make the hand/arm movements look soft and beautiful, how to move different arm joints independently in order to achieve that "wow!" effect, what kind of poses look good on stage, and how to combine arm moves with basic bump & grinds! 

Looking forward to seeing a bunch of you there! <3

More information and registration through the link below:

http://www.pineappleparadise.fi/pepper-sparkles/

Picture by Atelieri O. Haapala

Private party performance

Last night I had the honour and pleasure of performing at the birthday of a lovely lady I hadn't seen in about 5 years, and even thought I had the worst flu I've had for a very long time the audience were absolutely superb and gave me all the energy I needed!  I had such a great time, and I think it shows from the pictures ;-)

Tribal Salon 2016

I had quite a crazy year in 2015 when it comes to juggling things happening on the same day, and this is something that I decided I would like to become better at during this year. Or to be more precise, I decided that for my own sanity I should try not to book too many things onto the same day, specially when it involved running from a place to another. And guess what? It seems last year's karma somehow managed to send me a last reminder of why I should *really* try to keep it more relaxed in the future. 

Long story short, I had deleted the wrong event from my calendar back in autumn and I now found myself with three different appointments on the same day. Luckily it all work out in the end, so I started the new dancing year having the pleasure of dancing with wonderful people during the whole day. <3

In the morning I was part of Himo Club's show at the Love Me Do Fair, which won the price of best company of the year in the bachelorette party section. I'm so very proud of all my gorgeous students (also the ones that for one reason or another did not make it to the show)!!! <3

As soon as the show ended I headed to Kanneltalo for the rehearsal of our performance at this year's first Tribal Salon, which is an event organized by TribalTanssiKeskus. We performed our teacher Laura Luna's choreo "Gawazi", which is inspired by old school tribal bellydance and is so much fun to perform! Folk inspired costume with lots of vintage tribal jewelery/decoration and finger cymbals, what's not to love about it? The rest of the show was probably quite amazing, but unluckily enough I did not have the chance to see any of it, since I still had to make it to Tervakoski for this year's first corporate gig. 

A tiny bit stressful, but all in all a Saturday full of doing what I love best! <3

Fleamarket Finds, Vol.8

We did a quick visit to Tampere last Friday, and since we ended up having one hour to kill we visited a couple of our favourite fleamarkets. 

I found a lovely (probably German) 1920's/1930's ceramic jar and Lassi found some cooking knives plus a pair of really cute leather and fur folk slippers (probably 1960's) that happened to be just my size. The weather has been pretty chilly around here, so I can't wait to wear those! :-)

(They're at the moment being pre-emptively treated for possible pests, better be cautious than sorry!) 

Paljettipommi vol. 2 released!

Wooot, this is what the postman brought today, the second volume of Paljettipommi (the first and only burlesque magazine in Finland)! Packed in a lovely envelope by the force behind it, dear friend, burlesque performer and Paljettipommi's producer Kiki Hawaiji! 

I'm utterly honoured to have had the chance to be part of this second volume, together with burlesque legends Satan's Angel and Kitten de Ville, and many of Finland's best <3

Picture by JIRINA (www.jirina.fi)

New year!

So here I am again... The last year and a half has been the most insanely stressful of my life, and I have barely been able to keep up with things (specially the ones related to the internet). This year I would like to start from scratch and try to keep up and relax, since the sole idea of thinking about everything I should get done already gets me stressed. It is so that I have finally decided to leave all the belated posts aside for the time being. It was a rather difficult decision for someone as obsessive compulsive as I am, also because so many amazing things happened which I would love to share with you all. Nevertheless, unless I leave them aside for the time being and start writing about the current ones I will just keep accumulating them. 

Soooo, that being said here goes the first post of the new year! So many amazing things to look forward to. A new apartment (which I now share with the most amazing person I have ever met <3 ), some very scary but very exciting possible plans for this year and of course, the Helsinki Burlesque Festival! This will be the second to last year (9th edition) and the lineup is as spectacular as ever, and I couldn't be more excited about sharing the stage with the XXXettes! We are cooking something extra cheeky for the festival, and if you have ever followed the ticket sales for it you know you should act fast! It always sells out and once that has happened you will regret now having acted sooner ;-)

I will be updating the upcoming gigs section in the near future, but until then here goes the poster for this year's festival, fresh from the oven! 

The Shadow Seamstress

Last autumn was also the time to try some new things! Lassi's cousin Nick, who happens to be a cinematographer, had been wanting to shoot in Lassi's building ever since he first visited it last year, and he actually ended up turning that idea into a short movie! The movie was to be shot in Finnish, so I was extremely relieved that the character I was cast to play was actually mute :-D

It was nevertheless extremely exciting to act in a movie (first time ever! :-) ), and we had a wonderful team to work with. Besides Nick and Lassi (who took care of producing and assisting Nick with a wide variety of tasks) most of the people involved were close friends, such as Saara Salmi and Marco Melander from Atelieri O. Haapala and people from Fintage RY. Stay tuned, since the movie is now finished and that means we'll hopefully be able to show it somewhere in the near future! :-)

as Venetia van Kraemers
picture by Marianne Niemelä

Kae Montgomery workshops in Helsinki

The last weekend of August was reserved for bellydance, but unlike usually (I most often take Tribal Fusion related classes) this was all about ATS® (American Tribal Style), which is a bellydance style developed by Carolena Nericcio that is all about group improvisation and strong women! I had taken a couple of short ATS workshops before, but this one was a proper, long, ATS focused weekend, and I was quite terrified to be totally out of place. Luckily enough, and even though my ATS vocabulary is extremely limited, I was able to feel the joy of group improvisation and be proud of myself for facing such a challenge! Of course the wonderful teacher Kae Montgomery (who is a member of the FatChanceBellyDance® performing group) and the encouragement and patience of the other lovely students helped a LOT, I don't know what I would have been able to do without them!

On saturday we got to perform at the main show with our student troupe Kaira Tribe, so here you go a "fangirl" picture of a few of us with Kae! :-)

Left to right: Tiitta, Julia, Kae and me