The programme for this year’s festival – the world’s largest annual celebration of storytelling – has just been revealed by TRACS (Traditional Arts and Culture Scotland).
Exploring Scotland’s northern identity the tales featuring in this year’s event will come from the northern arc of countries including Finland and Iceland, Germany and Norway and Scotland.
International guest storytellers including Anna-Maria Toivonen from Finland, Georgiana Keable Jerstad and Mimesis Heidi Dahlsveen from Norway, Hjörleifur Stefánsson from Iceland, Jerker Fahlström from Sweden and Suse Weisse from Germany will share tales of Vikings, Huldufólk (or the hidden people from Iceland), trolls, the dark northern winters and some of their favourite traditional folktales.
Scottish storytellers will take audiences on a journey with some classic tales – often with a twist and tales from the Scottish Travelling Community passed down the generations. In a live event piper Gary West who wrote the Martyn Bennett biography Brave New Music will celebrate the Traveller ballads and stories which influence the late Bennett’s music kept alive through the Grit Orchestra.
At the end of October the Samhuinn Fire Festival in Holyrood Park will unearth a few dark tales about the dead or dying, with a workshop on Mortality and Making helping to craft conversations about death while weaving willow decorations for coffins.
The festival offers stories for all ages and there are many events for younger audiences during the October school holidays just before the festival proper begins on 22 October. Some outdoor events will take place at the Botanics.
As well as the programme of performances there is a workshop programme with a look at BSL and facial expression and movement bringing a story to life.
The Go Local programme will include more than 60 events elsewhere in Scotland, with some of the international storytellers guesting at other festivals in Orkney, Aberdeen and Dumfries and Galloway.
This year’s festival exhibition Stories Drawn from the Land, will be hosted at the Scottish Storytelling Centre on the Royal Mile from 27 September and it will feature ink illustrations and ceramics by Hester Aspland, whose work is rooted in the realms of folklore, wild places, landscape and history. Hester is also the illustrator of this year’s festival programme which is embedded below.
Culture Secretary, Angus Robertson, said: “The fantastic programme for this year’s Scottish International Storytelling Festival features something for everyone and brings together stars of Scotland’s storytelling scene with our north Atlantic neighbours to give light to dark winter nights through mystical stories and songs.
“The festival received £200,000 this year from our EXPO fund as part of a record increase in culture funding from the Scottish Government. We are proud to support this celebration of Scotland’s storytelling heritage and its important place on the world stage.”
Donald Smith, Scottish International Storytelling Festival Director said: “I’m very inspired by the chemistry of this year’s programme. Northern stories come from the forests, mountains and oceans, while drawing on an eerie imagination, surreal humour and hidden connections between human and natural spirits. Inner and outer journeys collide with unexpected magic. And Scotland is a hub and a crucible of this unique northern brew!”
Storyteller Riikka Palonen, who performed at the programme launch on Wednesday with musician Richard Clarke, said: “This festival is a very special and exciting time for me – as a relatively recent arrival on these shores, I feel honoured to be able to present the stories from my home land, here in the land of my new home.
“The stories I will be telling are rooted in the celestial origins of our northern mythology – tales born of the stars – and just as the starlight brings its glow to the darkening nights, I hope my tales can also cast a little light and wonder, if even for a short while.”
The Scottish International Storytelling Festival takes place from Wednesday 22 October to Saturday 1 November. For those planning on attending multiple events, the Festival Supporter Pass (£24) offers discounted tickets to many festival events, at the Scottish Storytelling Centre, as well as a discount at the Scottish Storytelling Centre’s bookshop, Haggis Box Café and an invitation to the Festival launch event.
Loading…
Reload document 
Open in new tab 
PHOTO Neil Hanna
