New Year, New Start - getting there

Ho ho ho

Many things have happened this year and a few challenges and changes have come and gone.

Dwali, Halloween, Hanukkah, have passed by and Christmas and Kwanzaa are fast approaching. I have moved a lot of my website, blogging and email services around after having issues and find myself dancing between the old and the new as I try out these newer services. I have performed at the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, TN and been invited, as a result, to two other large festivals! Under the Oaken Bough was published and released by Parkhurst Brothers in April, and my Gilgamesh CD won a gold awards from Parent's Choice the same month. One of my children went off to college, the other is getting through the last year of middle school (yikes)! A lot has been happening.
I guest hosted a few podcast episodes for Rachel Ann Harding's StoryStory Podcast, a wonderful show featuring some of the best traditional storytellers in the world. I have followed Ann's work for a while and have been to her workshop on podcasts and been working on my own. Her work is top notch.
http://storystorypodcast.com/

Working on the podcast!

A number of years ago we lost Brother Blue, then Diane Wolkstein, Sid Leiberman and some other storytellers and friends I have a great deal of respect for. Thinking on these losses, I wanted to create a podcast of interviews with some of the tellers who were part of the 1970's and early 1980's storytelling revival of the traditional art form. I am not interviewing those who tell personal stories, but instead those people who tell the old folk and fairy tales, myths, legends and yes, fractured fairy tales too. I interviewed the legendary Jay O'Callahan who really tells tales he has created himself, but I see these as fairy tales of a similar vein as Hans Christian Anderson. Jay is a master storyteller, a storytellers storyteller. As I have asked "who inspired you?" of some of the guests, it is more than once people have said - Jay!
Why do this, I have been asked by a few? 'There is such a small audience who might be interested in this what's the point?' The point is, for me, these people are walking libraries of folk tales. When they are gone we might have books and CDs, obituaries, reminisces, but no real idea of who these people are, what made them tick. I wanted to talk to these people and get their story in their own words and voices. To hear them laugh, and share thoughts and memories, ideals, wishes even. I know some of these people, some better than others. Some are my friends and mentors. Others I have only talked to via email - until the privilege of talking to them for these interviews. This will be a finite series. I have a list of people I want to talk to. I have already recorded Elizabeth Ellis, the Godmother of storytelling. Laura Simms, who some have called a shaman. Jay, Donna Washington, Megan Hicks and Papa Joe Gaudet. Bobby Norfolk and Odds Bodkin have said 'yes' to being interviewed, I am talking with Jim May and Tim Jennings, Diane Edgecombe and Elisa Pearmain in hopes to get their stories. All of these folks are "famous" or at least well-known and respected deeply in the world of storytelling. My list is much longer than here.

Performing at Jonesborough

I am creating this podcast through Buzzsprout and Patreon. Keep an ear out for it and let me know what you think. It's called "Conversations with Storytellers:  Wisdom, folk and fairy tales from our elders. A meeting with professional storytellers."
In this ever changing world there is and hopefully always will be great stories told by great people. My guests are some of our pioneers.

As the year winds down, I want to thank you all your support over the years, for reading, listening, booking me, sending me ideas and requests. Thanks for following me, sending me corrections for my website (I am very thankful for that!), and being one of my fans. All is greatly appreciated.

I hope this year has been as productive and exciting for you as it has been for me. And I hope great things happen for you in 2019, when it gets here!
Peace,
Simon

Why Do I Tell Folk Tales?

Why Folk Tales? 

Based on an interview with Sam Payne of BYU Radio, and the Apple Seed show.

http://preview.tinyurl.com/qyyggrj

Old folk stories are still around because they are such great stories. If I get a book published, that would be great, but I don’t expect it be around in 100 year’s time. How many books have been printed since 1900 and before, which are no longer in print, nor being read, or have even been forgotten? I want to give the Old Stories which have been around not just for hundreds of years but thousands, in some cases, the light they deserve, the voice that they need.

Arthur Rackham, 1910

Because the Old Tales, the folk and faerie tales, myths and legends have been passed down from generation to generation, during that time cultures change, way of life changes and the stories change with that. But they still have the core value, the core lessons in them, if you want to find the lessons in them. These stories are powerful, and strong, and yet adults and kids are not getting to hear them.  These stories are so deep, we need to get them out to adults as well as to children. Some of these tales have a lot of red meat in them. If you were to tell one or two of these to a group of kindergarteners they would be going home telling their parents: “Mummy, there was this scary man there, and I don’t want to go to school tomorrow.” Not all folk and faerie tales are like that, but there are a good number which are. And there are stories about life, love, growing up, and death. It is a shame that adults think it is stuff for kids, but it’s not all like that. There are many stories which are deep and have much meaning in them. I told my own version of Little Red Riding Hood to a group of 12 year olds who thought, when I mentioned it before I began, it was a little kids story. They saw another side of it, by the time I had told the tale. These tales were not meant for books, they need to be told.

I love the fact that the MOTH is out there and people are sharing their personal stories. I think it is great that people are sharing their stories. We all do it, whether on a stage, or by the water cooler. Some of the stories I have heard on the Moth, I wonder why they are shared and broadcast across the country if not the world, but they are interesting and some are great. It is all about empathy and how we see each other as other human beings, and how we translate our experiences with one another, or don’t!  But these tales, these shared experiences will not be around in 50 years time. The old folk tales need to be heard, too. I do not tell personal stories, not often, because these old tales are so important. We should be giving the Old Tales the air time they deserve, and need, and keep them for another few thousand years.

Yesterday I was told by one listener after my performance that she couldn’t tell stories. “But,” I told her, “You will be telling stories about your trip here, when you get home.” Teachers tell me they are not storytellers, yet the best teachers ARE storytellers. Humans inherently learn through story and experience. List a bunch of facts and they are hard to remember, but couch them in a story and the facts will stay. Some storytellers dress up, and act out stories, but there are many who do not. They may only use hand gestures (which they may or may not be aware of), or facial expressions, but there are some storytellers, who just use their voice, and a certain choice of words. And it always engages. Even the ‘most troublesome kid in the class.' Those are the ones who usually respond the best!

When you use folk tales, there is a layer of separation, and it is this which allows one to identify themselves safely with the stories. They can see issues and difficulties second-hand, if you will, which can act as a buffer, whether the audience is elderly and the story is about death, or the audience is a bunch of middles schoolers who are trying to deal with bullying.

Start with the personal stories, they are easier to remember after all. But then move into the folk and faerie realm of stories, share the myths and legends, and be prepared to see those Old Stories in a completely new light.

Simon Brooks (c) 2014