Jo Weldon's New York School of Burlesque

Performing at the Heavens in Seattle. Photo by Chris Blakeley . I found a video of me performing my International Lover number at the Zipper Theater in Shelly Watson's Interarts Variety show. It's the same number I performed in Margaret Cho's Sensuous Woman show. Although I've performed it in a few cities, I haven't yet done it at festivals because it's seven minutes long, and most festivals have a 4 or 5 minute rule! I don't really have a signature number, but if I did, this glitter-vomiting, shibari-tying number might be it. I've been doing this self-bondage since Fetish Diva Midori taught it to me about ten years ago when we were performing together at the Black & Blue Ball ! Posted by Jo Weldon, Headmistress of The New York School of Burlesque , for burlesquedaily.blogspot.com .

I found this clip via a member of Dita's website .

I adored Waxie Moon the minute I met him. He is one of the people, along with Indigo Blue and Paula the Swedish Housewife, who makes Seattle feel like my home away from home. And he's in the news! Above: Waxie at Tease-O-Rama, 2007. Photo by me. "[W]ith the encouragement of a New York friend and burlesque star named Dirty Martini, [he] took a burlesque class as a way to relax. He was the only man in the class and says he felt nervous, like he was intruding. But he was—as you'd expect from a Juilliard graduate—excellent." From Juilliard to Stripping for the B-52s: the Unlikely Career of Waxie Moon Above: Waxie in Dirty's class. He was great in my stocking peeling class as well! Photo by me. The article uses the word "monster," maybe in reference to Monster Beauty , which Dr. Lukki applies so beautifully to neo-burlesque . If Waxie is a monster, I love monsters an awful, awful lot. Posted by Jo Weldon, Headmistress of The New York School of B

Photo by Chris Blakely. While Tigger and Dirty Martini are preparing to go to Budapest to perform next week, The Atomic Bombshells are doing their thing in Shanghai . The music in the video clip in the article is from Ronnie Magri , who I interviewed earlier this week--expect to see that interview here shortly. Kitten La Rue is ultra hot in the clip, right? Check out more of the Atomic Bombshells in action! Posted by Jo Weldon, Headmistress of The New York School of Burlesque , for burlesquedaily.blogspot.com .

NOTE--you may receive this post twice, there were formatting issues with the first one! It's my birthday, so I got myself an interview with Catherine D'Lish. As I've mentioned previously, I'm crrrrrrazy about Ms. D'Lish. Above: Catherine, photographed by Sean McCall. How did you get interested in burlesque? Well, I was born with a dirty mind, I’m pretty sure! When I was very young, I spent plenty of time holed up in the garage, enjoying my daddy’s Playboy magazines. There were stacks of them- hours of fun! While growing up, I was fascinated with all things sexual. Long before I finished elementary school I had already had an excellent education, thanks to my mothers collection of “The Joy of Sex” and those types of books. I saw great photographs and references to strippers, stripping and also the Crazy Horse. All of that was particularly interesting to me. Once in a while, we would drive by a strip club that originally opened in the sixties, “Les Girl

There's burlesque in Helsinki: Helsinki Burlesque Presents And, the charming Paule Saviano will be showing his photos in Finland: Striptease Burlesque Photo Exhibition Photos by Paule Saviano Underground Photo Gallery Kirkkopuistonkatu 9, Lisalmi, Finland August 8, 2008- September 4, 2008 http://www.panhorama.net/index_uk.htm www.paulepictures.com The Striptease Burlesque photo exhibition will be exhibited in Helsinki during the Helsinki Burlesque Festival, January/February 2009. There's a photo of me in the show, from this photo shoot: Photo by Paule Saviano. For some reason, in many of the photos from that shoot I'm yelling or biting or snarling. I wasn't having a bad day--who could be having a bad day rolling around in their underwear on a pink velvet victorian sofa covered with boas? I was just rowdy! I would like to take my body over there with my photo and see this Finnish burlesque. In fact, I'd love to just travel around seeing burlesque

Some journalism students covered my most recent student showcase as a project for their class, and I give them an A--not just for the piece, but for their journalists' etiquette. It's usually fairly difficult to accommodate ANY press, much less students, and they made the most out of a really tight situation! They had to shoot from a rough angle and got about two minutes of time from each of us for the interviews. Posted by Jo Weldon, Headmistress of The New York School of Burlesque , for burlesquedaily.blogspot.com .

From Viola diGamba: Burlesque Photos by Marius Muresanu. From Cozy Josie: A Burlesque Chick Comes to a Bad End. Posted by Jo Weldon, Headmistress of The New York School of Burlesque , for burlesquedaily.blogspot.com .