OULU, Finland — Russia’s Kereel “Our Daddy” Blumenkrants turned and twisted and slid on his knees on an open-air stage in northern Finland on Friday, wowing spectators and convincing judges to name him World Air Guitar Champion 2015.
But it was a close call.
In the final round of 10 performers, Blumenkrants was tied with three-time U.S. national champion Matt “Airistotle” Burns from Staten Island, New York. Even a single throw of paper, rock and scissors between them ended in a draw, forcing a final showdown.
“Our Daddy” won with a wild but controlled thrashing-arm performance in a shiny spaceman rocker’s suit that he augmented in the last part of the show by wearing woolen gloves with flashing fingertips. The contestants mainly performed to medleys.
“It was the gloves that clinched it,” 2002 world champion Zac Munro of London said. “But both those guys were amazing. They knew the music note-for-note.”
What started off as a joke 20 years ago has grown into an annual fest of crazy pretend guitar players that draws people the world over to the city of Oulu, a high-tech hub on the Baltic Sea.
In 1996 there were eight competitors with one foreign champion, from neighboring Sweden. This year, a record 30 so-called “dark horses” from a dozen countries took part in the 20th Air Guitar World Championships, hoping to get into Friday’s final.
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