Fun Ahead at 35th CT Storytelling Festival & Conference at Conn College

New London, CT – The Connecticut Storytelling Center, in residence at Connecticut College, New London, celebrates its 35th Annual Storytelling Festival and Conference April 29-30th at College Center at Crozier Williams on the campus. The Friday/Saturday event (plus informal story swapping on Sunday morning at the Clarion Hotel) offers storytelling concerts and workshops on storytelling art and technique for the public, educators and historians. “History and Your Story” is the theme. For full information, visit www.ConnStoryCenter.org.

This year’s event also offers a rare opportunity to see hilarious South Carolina headliner, Tim Lowry, whose “Americana” performances mix the serious with laugh-out-loud funny in anecdotes of The Farmer’s Almanac--folks planting according to the Zodiac--a “Seersucker Perspective” of the “New South.” There’s no dust on this Mr. Chips--it’s more like seltzer down the breeches. “It’s the little rabbit trails that interest us most,” he said. 
 
Connecticut tellers are Glenn Harper, Jennifer Munro, Jane Bernoudy, and Valerie Tutson. Also hear Jo Radner, Dan Marcotte, Judith Heineman and Gail Herman. Tellers highlighting the Anne Izard Storytellers’ Choice Awards are Rita Auerbach, Karen Chace, Lauren Mendoza, Glenn Harper, Bill Wright, Tata Cañuelas and Kathy Jarombek. The Izard awards celebrate books on story and storytelling.
 
  You can sample one event or settle in for the weekend. Beginning Friday evening at 7:30 pm with a cabaret. Bard Dan Marcotte brings lute and irreverent drinking tunes and ghost stories with teller Judith Heineman, both of Illinois. Sing along and yuk it up. African-American teller Valerie Tutson (raised in New Milford) brings high energy, as does Lowry. 
 
Saturday workshops and performances right through Saturday night offer playful ways for historians, curators and teachers--in fact, anyone, to be engaging. Take in concerts and workshops. In workshops, you can learn how to tell tales effectively, for personal enjoyment, with or without music, as a teaching technique, and for historians, to engage patrons in tales from history. The workshop teachers are scholars, and professional storytellers with impressive credentials.
 
New awards will be given at this year’s Saturday reception for a Connecticut principal (Greg Fox of O’Connell School in East Hartford--the Spencer Shaw Award, named for the first African-American librarian in Hartford) and librarian (Pat Grundman of Hall Memorial Library, Ellington wins the first Kate McClelland Award, after a late, beloved librarian in Old Greenwich) who support storytelling, so vital to literacy. The annual Barbara Reed Award will also be given, this year to Gail Zeiba, who lives in Moosup, and is a librarian and longtime storytelling supporter in Willimantic. Barbara Reed founded the festival and was a professor in the Education Department at Connecticut College. 
 
New vendors this year include author/illustrator, Eric Sturtevant and Jennifer Lee Native American Bark Baskets. Others offer artisanal crafts, books on story, puppets, jewelry and hard-to-find storytelling CDs. 
 
“The Connecticut Storytelling Center’s professional storytelling is special--theater without a fourth wall. It offers all the catharsis of theater, but because every storyteller is unique, each breathes new life and perspective into the stories. Some are like an old shoe, some shock. Love the spoken word? Love sheer fun? Come play with us. If you promote a historic site, museum, business or city, come here to develop story skills that bring clarity and persuasiveness to your pitch, life to the tales in your own collections and organizations, in very enjoyable professional development. This ability translates into patrons who return to your venues, because they care more about your mission,” noted Executive Director Ann Shapiro.
 
“There’s nothing like a great story, well told. The 35th Annual Connecticut Storytelling Festival & Conference is the public’s chance to celebrate with us,” said Shapiro. “We love to welcome new friends and colleagues. Join us.”
 
Registration fees begin at $15, to $135 for the full festival. For full information, visit www.ConnStoryCenter.org. Like us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/ConnecticutStorytellingCenter/