Utatane Piko’s 10th Anniversary Live Party Fan Concert
Featured image is from the Piko’s 10th Anniversary Live Party Twitter. All credits for this and the following information go to the organisers.
Despite the sad story that our dear VOCALOID Piko had been discontinued a while back, fans have ardently shown their love and support for him in many forms recently. Our partner account Vocarnival held its own celebration, featuring an acrylic charm design contest, artzine and song contest, and we’re elated to know that people still want to share the love of Piko! Another initiative being held is Piko’s 10th Anniversary Live Party, a fan-made concert which looks very exciting indeed! Find out more below, and make sure to give the organisers your support for their efforts.
About Piko’s 10th Anniversary Live Party
The concert was first announced formally in December, explaining the main concept, what it’d be featuring and also the fantastic 3D MMD model that would be being used throughout (created by @jjinomu):
The initial plan was to have the concert premier on YouTube on February 28th 2021, as indicated, but the concert was rescheduled to premier on March 13th at 7 PM GMT:
How the concert will work:
It was also indicated that for anyone who wanted to watch the concert via a projection shadow box (similar to the concept of the Hatsune Miku “Hako Vision” hologram concert boxes), that a mirrored version of the concert would be uploaded after the initial regular premier! Place your device on top of your shadow box and enjoy a one-of-a-kind Piko concert in your very own home.
After some deliberation, it was also decided that producers who wanted to submit song covers featuring Piko would be able to for this 10th anniversary concert. It was announced that up to five people wanting to submit their cover could send in applications to be considered, making 5 songs chosen by the organiser(s) and 5 ones submitted by the public :
The final contributors were revealed on December 18th 2020:
Costume design contest
January 1st marked the announcement of the outfit design contest for the concert! The theme was “idol”, and the winning design would be used during the concert! :
The overall winner was announced on February 6th this year. Congratulations to @FlanPirate, @RiniiFluff and @TsuruRoach for their stunning work:
The overall winner will be turned into an MMD model and used within the concert – we can’t wait to see what it’ll look like!
One more call for fanart was made for the sake of use in the concert: fans could submit any of their art featuring Utatane Piko (until March 8th 2021), so we’re looking forward to seeing how fans’ works have been included in the final production.
Merchandise
Following on from the amount of interest in the concert, some merchandise has been put up for sale in their Etsy store! A very intriguing sneak-peak into what models will be used for the concert indeed:
The reversible charms are still available on their etsy store, so make sure to grab yourself an exclusive piece of awesome fan merch featuring our man Piko:
PikoLiveParty on Etsy: https://www.etsy.com/shop/PikoLiveParty
※Charms are limited to one batch, so they’ll only be avilable while stocks last!
Countdown
Every day until the concert date, the Piko concert account is showing a countdown post, with more sneak peeks at the models being incorporated in the concert:
General information (in a concise manner):
- Event name: Piko’s 10th Anniversary Live Party
- Platform: YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2v23BctUnLU
- Date and time: March 13th, at 7:00PM, GMT
We hope you’re as excited for the concert as we are! We love to share our love for vocal synths, and love the fact that the rest of the community feel the same way. Please make sure to join us in giving the Piko’s 10th Anniversary Live Party your support on March 13th!
** UPDATE ON MARCH 13 2021 **
The fated day of the concert is here, and the premier video for the concert has been uploaded to YouTube:
See you all at the concert!
~Tanudama
** UPDATE ON MARCH 14 2021 **
Following on from the concert, the Piko Live Party team (hereafter known under the handle of @VocaLiveParty on Twitter) are releasing references for all of the MMD models used for the concert. Check the Twitter threads for more information, including credits for the models and designs:
Only cover songs? Not originals? Covers aren’t special; anyone can do a cover. I can do a cover. It just makes the whole thing feel very run of the mill and not special at all. If they really wanted to celebrate the character, they’d have an original song lineup, or at the very least have original songs mixed in with the covers, like the Kotonoha concert.
I do respect that they’re using their own MMD models though. I know it’s probably way too much to expect original motion data (since they’re using covers) but that’d be super neato too.
Thanks for your comment, and I see what you mean! But yeah, the reason for them using cover songs is because this way, they can use pre-existing motion data, rather than having to compose original songs and then choreograph and animate their own dances (all of which takes a long time to do).
The team for the concert is made up of two or so people, plus anyone to submitted work or volunteered help, so you have to understand that it’s difficult to create a grand, ambitious concert with not much funding or manpower.
However, if this concert goes well, then they might consider bringing us another one next year/in the near future, and then they’d have more time, and could hopefully gather a larger team to bring us an even bigger concert in the future!
For now though, I hope that you’ll consider joining us in watching the Piko 10th anniversary concert later today, and with any luck, we can look forward to more incredible fan-made concerts in the future (especially ones with Piko).
~Tanudama