11Winter11 @ the Christmas Festival - TAO (Together As One) 12/12/21

Well, I’m not sure how many of you attended the fantastic TAO (Together As One) Charity Christmas Festival this past weekend, but it was amazing!! 11winter11 and his partner, Holly Giles are the founders of TAO which is a charity that organizes music events to gather donations for children’s charities. I have blogged Winter’s musical talent before, but he also has another amazing talent that deserves mentioning – that being his giving spirit to children in need. This year’s Christmas Festival supported “Feed A Smile” which is a charity that feeds children in Kenya and is run in SL by Brique Topaz and Sunray Moonites.

Organizing this festival is an enormous undertaking and preparations began a few months ago. There is an army of amazing SL people that help Winter and Holly organize this event, and Winter and Holly are very appreciative of all their help and made no qualms about recognizing and thanking them all.

The festival had 30 very very talented singers, and they all donated their time and talent. Scheduling these singers and coordinating hosts to work with them was an energy consuming task. I’m amazed how smoothly the show flowed. Can you imagine scheduling 30 singers for ten hours a day? Oh my Lord, I get dizzy just thinking about it!!

The TAO event also had such fantastic sponsors, and these sponsors should be very proud of their participation!! Donated raffles were part of the fun event along with many shops selling their specialty products. Lucky me I was able to find some pretty awesome Christmas fingernails while roaming the stores.

The venue was decorated to the hilts, and to quote my colleague Rads from his blog, “This is one of the most inviting and fun Christmas venues I’ve found in a long time.” A sleigh ride, a snow play area, Christmas Hunt, decorated trees, a train, snowmen, skating Santas, and plenty of falling snow gave the mood for that beautiful holiday spirit that we all enjoy.

Breaking some records seemed to be the norm at this year’s event. One record broken was the total amount of donations that were collected. The final total, which may be more after this blog is published, was $1,603,492 Lindens!! This outdid the Spring’s event total of $1,266,457 Lindens (which was no shabby total either). Another record breaker was when a total of over 100 avis landed on the venue for one of the shows. In all my years here in SL, I have never been to a show that had over 100 guest avis at one time. It was awesome to see!!!

I also have to applaud the many people who were at the shows just partying, donating lindens and having fun. Without all the fans, the success of this venture would not have been possible. Not only did fans come out to support their favorite artists and this wonderful cause, but many stayed for the entire ten hours each day just socializing! I had the opportunity to pop in here and there and saw some of the same faces working the crowds with cheerful, funny banter making all feel welcome and happy.

So I suppose I should mention Winter’s hour of singing lol…He began his set with a flurry of Christmas songs very familiar to everyone: “Little Drummer Boy”, “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town”, “Rockin Round the Christmas Tree”, “Jingle Bell Rock” and “Mary Did You Know”. Winter cast his own spin on these Christmas songs with his “rock style” and awesome voice going from low tones to high in the sky extended notes and his guitar enhancing his every word.

Many of the songs Winter sings have stories behind them filled with meaningful lyrics. “Man In the Mirror” by Michael Jackson, “The Bard's Song” by Blind Guardian, “I Have a Right” by Sonata Arctica, “When the Children Cry” by White Lion, “One Wild Night” by Bon Jovi, “A Reason to Fight” by Disturbed to name a few. One song, in particular, led me to research its lyrics, “Iris” by Goo Goo Dolls. “Iris” was written by John Rzeznik for a movie in 1998 called City of Angels. Nicolas Cage played an angel, and his job was to transition people when they died and went to heaven. But he fell in love with a real human woman, Meg Ryan, and he had to choose between his love for her and his eternal life. Rzeznik thought “Wow! What an amazing thing it must be like to love someone so much that you give up everything to be with them.” Hence the song was born.

“And I’d give up forever to touch you

cause I know that you feel me somehow,

you’re the closest to heaven that I’ll ever be

and I don’t want to go home right now.

Now when you hear Winter sing “Iris”, you will think of the angel who must choose between his love for this woman or his eternity. Anyone in your life that you’re loving that much that you would give up everything for them?

Winter closed the show and the event down by thanking again, with so much heartfelt compassion, every single person involved with the festival. And thank YOU Winter, Holly, the TAO army, and all the fans who supported this worthy cause to feed the children!! Awesome job!! Love you all! Xoxoxo Trishia

P.S. Winter and Holly – where in the world do you get your energy? I want some of that food you must be eating!! 😊