The Air Guitar World Championship - This Is Awesome

Posted by Nick Niesen on October 26th, 2010

Air guitar is the only way that many people will ever break into the music industry. It takes no skill. Anybody can do it. And you can do it anywhere because your instrument is always with you. Being able to play air guitar used to be a thing that nobody respected - until now. With the many championship contests in the country, the Air Guitar World Championship has now entered the fray. Playing the air guitar is no longer just something that the spastic-looking guy does when he is drunk. It is becoming a respected pastime.

Being able to play the air guitar is quickly becoming a popular pastime. There are competitions held where fellow air guitar players meet and compete against each other's air guitar playing abilities. The competitions follow the form of elimination contests in that you can only move on by winning each of your matches. Regional winners move on to compete in the national finals. Their airfare and expenses are paid for in order to get to the venue for the competition. Winning the national finals will move the air guitarist to the world finals in Finland. This is the final stop. Money is not offered as a reward for winning, so it seems like a long way to go just to gain notoriety as the Air Guitar Champion of the World.

The rules are straightforward and self-explanatory. Each performer will play a song that they have chosen, and hopefully practiced, for sixty seconds. Then there is the compulsory round, which is where the judges pick a song for you, and you have to play their song for sixty seconds. The tricky part about the compulsory round is that the sixty seconds of the song can start from anywhere within the song. Therefore, you could be stuck playing the end of a song that you don't even know. The rules say that you must play an invisible instrument, and that instrument must be a guitar (drums are not allowed). Also, air roadies are allowed but they have to clear the stage before the performance can begin. There is a rule that prohibits back up bands, so if you were thinking of bringing your friends along for the ride, make sure that they stay in the audience and not on the stage. Performances are judged based on your technical ability, stage presence, and the "airness" of your performance.

Sometimes things like this cause one to be torn between art appreciation and craziness. Is there really a need for the Air Guitar World Championship? Should one just be thankful not to be entered in the competition or dating someone who is? However, one can also see how this art form, or expression, would be a fun, different, and exciting way to spend a weekend. Hey, at least you get to travel for free. The optimum way to enjoy something that involves pretend play as an adult, it would seem, is to tap into your inner child and - rock on!