Sandbox Land: Monthly family-friendly variety show (until November) 2015

Sand Box Land is the brain-child of Katherine Phelps and Morgan Phillips.

Tucked away in a funky venue in North Melbourne this is a little show with a big heart. Inspired by The Muppets and Garrison Keillor, Katherine and Morgan gather up musicians, comedians, storytellers and poets and create a family-friendly variety show around a theme. In May the theme was super heroes and every contributor had their own take.

I went to Sandbox Land as part of a group celebrating a birthday. We enjoyed a meal (there are many places to eat nearby) .. so it was dinner and a show. We had a bunch of kids with us and it was obvious they had a ball, and we had a ball watching them. When they saw children in the front row, the comedians and storytellers adapted their material at super speed– most impressive!

Quirky, friendly and bizarre, Sandbox Land feels like it’s happening in someone’s house rather than a venue.

Performers for May included: 

Comedian: Dilruk Jayasinha


Storyteller: Ian McNally

Singer: Yasemin Arifoglu, 

Singer/Musician: Chris Southall

Poet: Lana Woolf

Cosplayer: Sam Dowling


Sketch Performers:
 Gabe Hogan and 
Kaska Harvey Zielinski 

(A few SAV members in there!)

For venue and booking details visit the Sandbox Land website: HERE

There are family and child discounts!

pics north to south: The cast of the May Sandbox Land, Ian McNally, Lana Woolf, Katherine Phelps 

Posted by Jackie Kerin for SAV. 

Please send  news of your events to share on our blog to storytellingvic@live.com.au ATT: BLOG 

WORKSHOPS, PERFORMANCES, DISCUSSIONS AND OPEN FLOOR at the Glen Eira Storytelling Festival June 2015

WORKSHOP: TEENA HARTNETT

True stories, said, not read

Sat June 20

10.00am

Learn how to craft stories from your life or from the lives of others. Develop skills to speak from the heart, rather than read, and deliver your story in a way that moves and entertains. You will be helped to identify events and characters to create a personal narrative beyond anecdote, to a satisfyingly shaped piece for telling. Wouldn’t you like to step up to the mic and share a story?

Please bring pen and paper.

The workshops will culminate in a performance at Santucci’s Café Carnegie.

Pic: Teena Hartnett in action at Rocket Clock Story Slam

DETAILS OF VENUE AND BOOKINGS   HERE 

 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------

OPEN FLOOR: HOSTED BY TEENA HARTNETT

True stories, said, not read

Sat June 20

5.00 pm

Curated personal storytelling events have never been so popular. In the US, there is The Moth (New York), This American Life and in Australia there is the ABC’s Now Hear This.  In Melbourne, people gather throughout the year at thematic nights of story: The Cock and Bull, Rocket Clock, Storytelling Nights at The Elwood Lounge and Laborastory. Wouldn’t you like to step up to the mic and share a story?

 DETAILS OF VENUE AND BOOKINGS HERE (FREE EVENT)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

PERFORMANCES: ROSLYN QUIN

The Echoes of Heirlooms

Mon 15 June  6.00 pm

Mon 22 June  6.00 pm

Join Miss Roslyn Quin at Antique Bar as she dusts off a myriad of antiques to weave her original tales of the preposterous from grandmothers and great uncles you never had... but on evenings such as this, and with a teller like her, you can rest assured that the tales won’t stay safely in the cabinets and drawers where she found them.

DETAILS OF VENUE AND BOOKINGS HERE

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

DISCUSSION: THE MONASH FAIRY TALE SALON

Alice in Wonderland — 150 years

Sat June 13

1.00 pm

pic: John Tenniel

The Monash Fairy Tale Salon is hosting a curious afternoon of madness and muchness as we go down the rabbit hole in celebration of the 150th anniversary of Lewis Carroll’s classic Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Come along and learn about the author and illustrators who shaped literary history and gave us such wonderfully uncommon nonsense. For the bold at heart (or the Queen of Hearts), come dressed as your favourite wonderland character! This event - part of the Glen Eira Storytelling Festival - is open to anyone who has a love for nonsense.

Alice in the The Garden of Live Flowers

 pic: artwork Karan Wicks

Louisa John-Krol is among the wonderlanders. Hailing from Storytelling Australia Vic, The Monash Fairy Tale Salon, Writers Vic and Australian Fairy Tale Society, she’ll perform her song, “Alice in the Garden of Live Flowers”. Recorded twice, in two studios, with different producers (Spring Studio with Harry Williamson; Siamese Studios/Eden with Brett Taylor), it is a hybrid, chopped and grafted: Alice moves between sonic rooms, through dream-doors. Released on French record label Prikosnovenie in the CD Ariel, it sold out of all editions but is at Bandcamp.

Listen to Alice in the The Garden of Live Flowers at Bandcamp HERE 

Shrinking, expanding, the song sometimes drops out completely. Flowers speak, petals scatter... free-fall?

Would you like to be in this act? Feel like swishing across the stage as a flower, darting as a rabbit, or sipping tea with the March Hare, Mad Hatter and Dormouse? Puppets, butterflies, windchimes, botanical hats and other quirks welcome: arielsflight@optushome.com.au    

Happy Anniversary, Alice!

DETAILS OF VENUE AND BOOKINGS  HERE (FREE EVENT)

WORKSHOP AND PERFORMANCES at the Williamstown Literary Festival 13 -14 June 2015

WORKSHOP: KATE LAWRENCE

True Tales, Told Live

Sat June 13

10.30am - 12.30pm

It is an amazing process to work on the events from your life to craft them into oral stories. It is not only creative, develops communication skills, is satisfying and creates a story you can give to others, it deepens your sense of who you are.   It is also fun and just a little bit thrilling.

This workshop is interactive.  You will be exploring your life and pulling on memories; sharing and shaping them, reflecting and learning, listening and watching as others do the same.   It maybe that you already have an idea for a story you want to work on, or you may think you’ve got no stories - either is fine.  We will be doing exercises to explore our history and find memories we can turn into fantastic stories - we all have them.

Please bring a pen, a notebook, and a sense of adventure.  A good nights sleep, and a fed belly also help.

BOOK HERE

PERFORMANCES:  JACKIE KERIN

Tales from the Flyway 

June 13

2.00pm – 3.00 pm

Recently I met violinist Sarah Depasquale at the Newport Fiddle and Folk Club. We discovered we share a love of bikes, sensible shoes, binoculars and storytelling and decided to combine our skills in a collaborative storytelling adventure.

Sarah and I live in Hobsons Bay where there are five significant wetland sites. A week would not go past without us walking or riding our bikes along the ponds and checking in on the birds. Some of the migratory shore birds that travel between the Arctic tundra and SE Australia can be spotted over spring and summer. These are birds that connect us to countries via wetlands and transcend language and cultural boundaries. The corridors that the birds travel are called Flyways and Hobsons Bay is on the East Asian Australasian Flyway linking us to Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, China, Japan, Mongolia …

What more inspiration does a musician and storyteller need?

The structure of Tales from the Flyway is simple. If we were to fly with the birds and visit the chain of wetlands in the countries along the flyway, what stories might we hear? Sarah and I have harvested stories from Indonesia, Thailand and Siberia. Our final story is a kamishibai story that has been passed down the Flyway from the Yatsuhigata Tideland in Japan (in 2008) to Boondall in Brisbane and then on to us (2015) for telling in Hobsons Bay. For me, receiving this story was very moving – a validation that there are people who see the big picture and don’t allow bureaucracy to get in the way of an idea. I thank the Yatsuhigata Tidelands Observation Centre, Brisbane City Council and the Rangers at Boondall Wetlands.

I would also like to thank City of Melbourne Arts Grants and the SAV series Words on the Wind that gave me time to work on this idea.

Hope some of you can join Sarah and me for Tales from the Flyway.

This is some video taken on world Migratory Bird day where Sarah and I adapted a story to share with children but please note  Tales form the Flyway is not suitable for the very young.

BOOK HERE 

Kamishibai: Stories on a Bike 

June 14

12.00pm - 1.00pm

Kamishibai (paper theatre) is a kind of visual storytelling once popular in Japan in the 1930s and 40s. Connected to comic book making and anime, kamishibai is experiencing resurgence around the world. Many kamishibai storytellers who work in as many languages, connect via the internet to share ideas for building rigs and picture cards are swapped as jpegs or pdfs. Google translate is a wonder!

The box used to frame the pictures is called a ‘stage’. I have two – a beautiful handcrafted stage made from recycled eucalypt made by my friend Ted Smith from the Newport Fiddle and Folk Club and another that I made from papier mache and heavy duty cardboard. This one I can fix to my bike, take to the streets and parks and busk. If you are interested, you can see the plans for this one on the SAV site under RESOURCES

I’d love to meet you in the Williamstown Town Hall at the Festival, tell some tales and share the magic of stories on wheels.

*(with children in mind but everyone will enjoy)

BOOK HERE