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Click on the town or city name below to read a report from that site.
| Dent,
Minnesota |
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Our area has had little exposure to oral tradition storytelling. Most
folks have an image of children in a semi-circle staring up at someone
reading to them from a thin book illustrated with bright pictures.
TELLABRATION! is one of the components in our efforts to broaden the
storytelling experience for our community members. A daylong introduction
to telling workshop was held the Saturday prior to TELLABRATION!. Four of
the participants worked on their stories and got up in front of their
first live audience of listeners on Friday, November 17.
The New York Mills Regional Cultural Center is located in a town of
1,054 people on the far eastern edge of East Otter Tail County, Minnesota.
Tellers and listeners came from "Mills" and nearby rural areas
and the towns of Wadena (4,049), Perham (2,441), and Dent (172).
We had no idea how many listeners or tellers to expect and so flexible
was the ruling theme. The evening began with a reminder about the
international flavor of the event and the magic of storytelling as an
ancient art connecting communities over time and distance. The
Proclamation was read. The storyteller emcee filled out time and balanced
the mood. The workshop participants floated through their tales of Pegasus
fantasy, the poignant origin of Taps, and incredibly believable tall
tales.
Producers wish for hundreds of listeners to attend TELLABRATION! Our
event was blessed with an intimate group, which mentally held our novice
tellers' hands as they moved each one on their journey from stage fright
to accomplishment.
We now have the core group needed to form a story guild; six more story
events are planned for the area through next August; and then
TELLABRATION! 2001 planning will begin to set the stage for another group
of novice tellers.
Sonja Kosler |
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| Tuolumne
County, California |
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We did it! Tonight we had a wonderful turnout for our 2nd Tellabration!
85 people gathered to hear 10 tellers. And the response was grand! At the
end a group of 3 high school age girls said they'd like to tell a story
next year as Story Theatre. It was wonderful. We had 2 student tellers,
one 17 and one 13, telling well-polished folktales. A veteran teller, who
has been on hiatus for 8 years, returned to the telling spotlight tonight
with great response. A local author read her new book. The county
children's librarian told a favorite ghost story. An 82 year-old woman
recited poems that she'd learned from her mother. And a 78 year-old
veteran of WWII, Korea, and Vietnam told hair-raising airplane stories of
his flying days. And the Story Quilters did their part, along with a
wonderful musician, Bill Roberson. I can't say enough about how special
this night was in our community. Everyone was honored to be a part of this
larger event, too. Thanks for Tellabration!
B.Z. Smith |
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| Parker,
Colorado |
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Along with the Proclamation, I always begin out Tellabration programs
with a statement that this program is part of a worldwide event, but here
it is also a library program. Since the library has a general policy about
not ever charging for programs, I like to think of our Tellabration events
as a gift to our audience members. A gift of stories- that offer
reflection and joy for all our listeners. With the busy holiday season
about to begin, I hope that these stories will provide moments of peace,
laughter, and sense of community to all the audience.
Priscilla Queen |
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| Valojoulx,
France |
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19,000 years ago, people perhaps were telling stories on a rainy
November 18th evening right near the village where I told in 2000.
Valojoulx is a small village of some 800 souls and is just 6 km up the
road from Lascaux. This prehistoric site boasts the world's most
astonishing cave drawings that date back to the Magdalenian era. And it
was in Valojoulx, in southwestern France, half way between Bordeaux and
the Spanish border that the Louberou Festival of Story invited me for a
Tellabration!
It's the third consecutive year I have anticipated in a Tellabration!
The first two I helped organize in part in my own village near Lyons. But
what was distinctive about our event this year was a program of tales and
...flavors. I call it "Two Mouths in One."
Using the 17th century, Neapolitan frame story Lo Cunto delli Cunti
or the Tale of Tales, for each of the five stories, the audience was
invited to savor the exotic: palmnut oil soup, or a refreshing, chilled
anisette herbal tea, etc. As they slurped and munched, I guided them along
with Zoza in her quest to win back her husband, Tadeo, who she had
awakened from an enchanted sleep by filling a jar with her own tears!
The performance, including dessert, lasted about an hour and a half and
I think the most satisfying comment I heard was from a pharmaceutical
salesman who said to me, "How impressive it was to hear the name of
our little village mentioned in a worldwide storytelling
Proclamation!" And I thought, who knows, maybe 19,000 years hence,
that same Proclamation might read, "From Miami to Mombassa, from
Texas to Taiwan and from Valojoulx to - Mars, life forms from all over are
gathered together tonight in the joy and anticipation of story!!"
Sam Yada Cannarozzi |
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