Yes, that’s me (Conrad Askland) sitting at the ice piano during a performance of the Cirque du Soleil show CRYSTAL. (Photo by Caroline Thibault)
We just finished a wonderful two weeks performing in Montreal, Canada over Christmas with the Cirque du Soleil show CRYSTAL. Not only were the audiences wonderful to perform for, the cast of Crystal also got a private tour of the Cirque du Soleil International Headquarters in Montreal. Wonderful city. Wonderful audiences.
We had a great time performing the Cirque du Soleil ice-skating show Crystal in Oslo, Norway! Great audiences and I was able to see many of my relatives as well. Six shows at the Spektrum Arena in Oslo, Norway. Here are photos from our Oslo performances. Photos by Mike Hillingseter
Photos by Hugo Cortes of Crystal by Cirque du Soleil in Malaga, Spain in December 2022. This is in the middle of our European Tour of Cirque du Soleil’s only ice-skating touring show “Crystal”. A couple shots in here of me playing accordion on stage during the Malaga, Spain run. Thank you Hugo Cortes for the wonderful live photos of our Cirque du Soleil performance!
Thank you so much to our German audiences for being so much fun. It has been a thrill to play with the musicians on the wonderful Cirque du Soleil music score to Crystal (Music by Maxim Lepage). The ice skaters and acrobats never cease to amaze me with their beautiful ice skating and circus stunts
I’m loving our tour so far through Europe as I perform music with the Cirque du Soleil show “Crystal”. Here are some live show photography from our performances in Nuremberg, Germany. Photos by Florian Stangl (Click images to view full size)
Musicians from the Cirque du Soleil Varekai band taken June 2017 in Vilnius, Lithuania by Gabrielus Jauniskis.
From left to right: David Piché (violin), Conrad Askland (bandleader and keyboards), Mikey Hachey (bass), Isabelle Corradi (singer), Jamieson Lindenberg (singer), Damion Corideo (percussion), Jose Manuel Pizarro Carmona (winds) and Paul James Bannerman (drums).
It is an absolute pleasure to work with this group of musicians!
I am thrilled to be joining Cirque du Soleil’s show Varekai as bandleader and keyboardist on their world tour. The show has been on a world tour since 2002 and I will be joining them on the final legs in Europe and ending in the United States in 2017.
Macau, China – Just announced to the cast and crew of the Cirque Du Soleil show Zaia that it is closing in Macau and last performance date will be Feb 19, 2012. Official announcements are currently being made by Cirque publicly. Zaia opened as a resident show at the Venetian Macau resort and casino in September 2008.
ZED had it’s last performance December 31, 2011 at Tokyo Disneyland. I was lucky to travel to Tokyo in October 2011 to see this Cirque Du Soleil show and meet the artists and musicians. The show and music were so fantastic. Consensus is that this was one of Cirque’s best shows. It’s an artistic crime that it is closing. I mean it was fantastic beyond words. It had that Cirque “magic” through out.
There are always hopes with the fans that the show will resurrect somehow – but Cirque has redeployed many of the artists to other shows and the ZED theater was built for the show which makes it difficult to move somewhere else. Artistically I know in my heart that whatever happens the original magic of ZED will have to be a time capsule for the short time it ran – about 3 years. A new magic can continue but you can’t go back and recreate the same magic.
To the musicians, artistic team and cast of ZED I say what you already know: You created a one-of-a-kind masterpiece that you can always carry in your theatrical heart. You were part of something truly magical…
In this video the various Cirque Du Soleil shows say goodbye to ZED, including the show I work currently work on: ZAIA.
Barbara Walters interviews Cirque Du Soleil founder Guy LaLiberte.
“One of the things that makes billionaires successful is their reaction to failure.”
– Robert Frank, Wall Street Journal
That is such a great quote. Maybe not in the context of billionaires, but in the context that to be successful there is usually a lot of risks and with that comes occasional failure. It’s how we react and use those failures that can help propel us to each new chapter and goal.
