WONDERFUL BEAST THEATRE COMPANY
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  • HOME
  • About Us
  • Work
    • Bubble Wrap
    • Lockdown Tales >
      • Lockdown Tales Full List >
        • Lockdown Tales Readers
      • Lockdown Tales: Folktales
      • Lockdown Tales: Verse
      • Lockdown Tales: Modern Stories
      • Lockdown Tales: Musical Tales
      • The Quangle Wangle's Hat Competition >
        • Competition Gallery
    • Shows >
      • First the Dance, The the Feast
      • The Last Woodwose
      • Return of the Wildman
      • Strange Fish
      • YES: The Adrian Mitchell Show
      • The Dead Moon
      • Maps of Desire
      • Tatterhood
      • The Wolf Road
      • Birth of Pleasure
    • Schools >
      • I Am a Woodwose
      • Abiyoyo & the Musicians of Bremen
      • The Coat of Umpteen Pockets
      • Little Red Chunni
    • Community >
      • The Nightingale
      • The Six Swans
      • Now and Then
      • Behind the Scenes at Mary Warner's
      • Memories of Suffolk
    • Family Shows >
      • Orla Tour
      • Orla's Moon
      • Orla and the Sun
      • The Swineherd and The Princess & The Pea
    • Festivals >
      • How Night Came from the Sea
      • Storm of Stories 2016
      • Storm of Stories 2014
      • Storm of Stories 2012
    • Events >
      • Bottom's Dream
      • Almeida Theatre Benefits
    • Podcast: Stories from the Archives
  • WB Singers
  • Whispers
  • Contact
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YOUR CART

​'IN WATER, I SANG WITH WHALES, CHATTERED WITH DOLPHINS, WHISPERED WITH FISH...'
FROM RETURN OF THE WILDMAN

19/7/2022 0 Comments

Save the date and plans for the future

Thank you!​
​

Last month we were delighted to stage First the Dance, Then the Feast at Thorington’s beautiful woodland amphitheatre. The project saw 80 Suffolk primary school children and a full professional cast and musicians performing a collaboratively created adaptation of a Hungarian folktale. 
Children and artists of many nationalities came together on stage as one company under the banner of Wonderful Beast. The sun shone, the birds and children sang, and throngs of you came to see the show, for which we thank you very much. Receiving such an enthusiastic response from the audience made a huge difference to these children – and our team – all of whom had worked so hard to make this production a reality.
Enormous thanks to our generous funders and sponsors, without whom the project could not have taken place.
Save the Date! Wonderful Beast’s 25th Birthday Celebration​
​

To mark our 25th birthday, we’re putting on a celebratory show on Sunday November 27th, 4.00pm at Aldeburgh’s Jubilee Hall. It will be a journey through some of the most magical moments of Wonderful Beast’s quarter century and sees some of our longest-standing artists contributing, including loyal patrons Dame Penelope Wilton and Gemma Jones, alongside many more great talents. Please put the date in your diaries and we’ll be in touch as tickets become available – we’d love to see you all.
The Wonderful Beast Arts Hub
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Having now had a little time to turn our thoughts back to everyday life, we’re planning some changes for the future of Wonderful Beast.
After two and a half decades of mounting productions, touring nationally, staging our own Storm of Stories festivals, producing community operas, running storytelling and outreach projects for all ages, we have amassed a huge archive of material and experience. So, next year we are shifting our focus and offering Wonderful Beast as a rich and invaluable resource for schools, arts organisations, individuals, writers, composers, and performers, as well as a facility for providing practitioners on request for specific projects.

This transition from charity to sole trader from January 2023 will see Alys Kihl take on the role of consultant and custodian of the archives. To all the Friends of Wonderful Beast, we therefore suggest you cancel your subscriptions after December, and we thank you wholeheartedly for your invaluable loyal support over the years.
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18/5/2022 0 Comments

making a feast of it

We're delighted to announce our three production sponsors for First the Dance, Then the Feast: Henham Park, Ben Wardle Fine Art and L'Escargot Sur Mer. 

Henham Park, just a little way north of our venue Thorington Theatre, is one of the largest listed parks in the country and the home to Latitude Festival. Owned by the Rous family since 1544, the park hosts weddings and events, pop up pizza on Wednesdays and has two beautiful holiday lets. Find out more about this glorious place, which has a fascinating history, at www.henhampark.com.

Ben Wardle is a fabulous local artist based in Snape, Suffolk. He paints stunning landscapes using mixed media, inspired by his time riding horses around the Sandlings area of our AONB. He is especially interested in ecoanxiety and solastalgia (a kind of nostalgia for landscapes lost to climate change) and is currently exhibiting at Ballroom Arts gallery in Aldeburgh. His daughter is one of the children taking part in First the Dance as part of the Snape Primary School class. You can see more about Ben at www.benwardlefineart.net.

L'Escargot Sur Mer are neighbours to WB HQ in Aldeburgh, and the Suffolk coast sister restaurant to the famous L'Escargot in Soho. They're refurbishing to reopen as a boutique hotel with a delicious menu and a stunning wine bar. Opening later this year, you can sign up to their newsletter to be first in line for a truly memorable feast when booking opens. ​https://lescargotsurmer.com.

Huge thanks to all three for supporting First the Dance, Then the Feast. We can't wait to see you all on opening night!
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22/3/2022 0 Comments

first we dance...

The Wonderful Beast team had a fantastic week last week at our residency developing our upcoming show and workshop series First the Dance, Then the Feast, which has its taster launches in schools tomorrow and Thursday.

The project involves eighty schoolchildren from three Suffolk primary schools - one urban, two rural - where we'll be workshopping through the summer term. The children will then all come together with their parts of the production, to perform with a professional cast and musicians on stage at the magical Thorington Theatre on the 23rd and 24th June.  

We were lucky enough to have the use of the fantastic West Hill Barn for the residency, where some of you will remember having seen a performance of The Last Woodwose back in 2019. We've got the most fantastic creative team (find out who by clicking here) who were hard at work all last week sharing and learning traditional folk songs, dances and music and composing, writing and developing the structure of the play itself. We're hugely excited about what's to come.

You can find out more about the show and who's involved by clicking here, and tickets can be bought through the Thorington Theatre box office.

Bogdan Vacarescu and Daniel Peart
Matt Prendergast and Bogdan Vacarescu
Director Emma Bernard
Matt Prendergast and Hilary Greatorex
Bogdan Vacarescu

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26/9/2021 0 Comments

thank you party!

We are grateful to Tim and Lucy Rowan-Robinson (Chair of Wonderful Beast’s Board of Trustees), who hosted in their beautiful garden a late September party for Wonderful Beast, with the purpose of extending a huge thank you our loyal funders, friends, supporters, volunteers and fabulous local artists.
WB's Emma Close-Brooks
WB Trustee Loesje Houghton and Actor Rob Jarvis
Harpist Zoe Anderton
WB Chair Lucy Rowan-Robinson, writer Thea Smiley and husband Alex
It was a joyful occasion for people to meet - some for the first time, others after a long period of non-socialising due to Covid-19 - in a glorious setting and on a balmy evening. Chatter was dappled with bewitching folk music played by the brilliant Zoe Anderton on her magnificent concert harp. Romanian wine (in keeping with the Eastern European theme of our next project) and canapés, provided by our hard-working and multi-talented trustees, went down famously. 
Celia Lewis and Auriol Marson
Richard Kihl and Pippa Marson
Richard Kihl, Tim Rowan-Robinson, Richard Marson and Pippa Marson
Frank Jackson Foundation's Amanda Taylor and WB Trustee Loesje Houghton
'What fun it was last night, and how wonderful to be at a party. Not only that, but one full of like-minded people. 
​It made me realise how much I’ve missed things like that, seeing people not just at home.
So thank you, all for your generosity, and long live Wonderful Beast!'
​
 - PARTY GUEST
Rachel Laughton-Scott and actor Petra Markham
First Light's Genevieve Christie with writers Claude Harz and Julia Blackburn
Actor Petra Markham and Auriol Marson
Poetry People's Naomi Jaffa, poet Dean Parkin and Pippa Marson
Flares and fairy lights lit the garden as dusk fell and Alys gave her thank you speech, telling everyone of the Beast’s future plans. As the grand finale to the evening, actor Petra Markham read ‘The Hare and the Hedgehog’ from Water de la Mare’s Told Again (Princeton, 2019) with everyone gathered around to listen, in true storytelling tradition.
WB Founder and Artistic Director Alys Kihl
The Assembled Company
Actor Petra Markham reading 'The Hare and the Hedgehog'
All photos copyright Sophie Baker 2021. Not to be reproduced without permission.
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16/8/2021 0 Comments

Bubble Wrap Pop Along Picnic!

An invitation from Wonderful Beast and Wardens Trust was enjoyed by participants from our Zoom project, Bubble Wrap, during the last covid Lockdown.  This time, we had the pleasure of actually meeting each other in person at Wardens Hall in its wonderful setting on the clifftops of Sizewell beach. House Manager Bev greeted everyone with tea or coffee and the most delicious array of her home-made cakes.  

It was a beautiful summer’s day and poet Dean Parkin, actor Hilary Greatorex and WB's Artistic Director Alys Kihl led a workshop in a bosky shaded area, with the gentle sound of the sea below and a slight breeze rustling the leaves  over us. 
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Warm up games including ‘Bunnies’ taught by Hilary produced group hilarity
The song Bella Mama was learnt, and poem ‘The Table’ by Turkish writer Edip Cansaver stimulated our creative juices as we all ‘placed’ our own imaginings and wishes on our ‘table’. With Dean’s inimitable coaxing, a group poem emerged that triggered conversation and great pleasure in our achievement though such simple means.  Hilary initiated some wonderful improvisations from the group with her drama exercise featuring an orange, its texture and how we would cut it and eat it. 
 
Caroline Way read for the group her poem 'The Tardigrade', written during the online series in response to this seemingly indestructible creature who became a favourite subject during the Zoom project. Richard Williams also read his beautiful poem 'Swift'. 
 
Then it was picnic time. The fun of chatting to each other in person was what we had been missing during lockdowns. However, Zoom was a boon for those who couldn’t have travelled to a specific venue. Looking ahead to the forthcoming dark winter months when everyone prefers to stay at home, we are hoping to bring about Bubble Wrap 2, which will be open to new participants alongside our original Bubble Wrappers, who we will welcome back with delight. 
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19/4/2021 3 Comments

Annie Blaber: In Memoriam

Annie Blaber, loyal and devoted Trustee of Wonderful Beast since its inception in 1997 till 2019
Words from Wonderful Beast's Artistic Director, Alys Kihl
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We are terribly sad to announce the recent death of our wonderful friend, supporter and collaborator, Annie, who was for so many years such an integral part of the company. Together she and I concocted many productions and events, including community operas in our Storm of Stories festivals, for which she generously commissioned composers Richard Chew and John Barber. Her organisation, Children's Music Workshop, co-founded with Jane Pountney (and of which I was fortunate to be a part), provided amazing musical opportunities to thousands of primary school children in deprived areas of London and beyond. Workshops were led by incredibly talented musicians mainly from the Guildhall of Music and Drama, and many of whom, over the years, Wonderful Beast has been lucky enough to recruit for its own productions.
 
Another of Annie’s great achievements was to form ‘Woven Gold’, a refugee choir from the Helen Bamber Foundation. Singing together and performing publicly provided immense solace and joy to everyone involved and to their enthusiastic audiences. None of this would have happened without her vision and energy and determination, together with the leadership of the marvellous  musicians who shared her deep commitment.
 
Above all Annie was a wonderful friend. We travelled to India, Romania, and Spain together and I spent many happy times in Scotland with her. Her beautiful house in London was a place of creativity and activity with people coming and going, where great meals, chats, heart to hearts and huge enjoyment of each other's company took place.  I miss her terribly as does everyone who knew and loved her.
3 Comments

25/3/2021 0 Comments

bubble wrap!

LOCKDOWN TALES was Wonderful Beast’s answer to the first lockdown in March 2020, when it initiated an online series of over 50 stories and poetry recorded by actors, musicians, poets, a dancer for children around the world to enjoy.
 
BUBBLE WRAP came next in the third Lockdown (Feb/March 2021): a pilot project for the over 65s, in partnership with Wardens Trust. A series of online workshops, Bubble Wrap took place via the magic of Zoom, bringing together participants from across East Anglia.

It was led by four brilliant artists – Dean Parkin (poet), Martina Schwarz (musician), Hilary Greatorex (actor), and Anusha Subramanyam (dancer), under the umbrella of Wonderful Beast.  Originally called 
Connect and Create, the project evolved into Bubble Wrap thanks to Dean's poem of the same title, which got the whole project rolling and broke the ice. That and the folk tale of The Old Woman and the Vinegar Bottle, were the creative starting points for every group.
 
In this particular time of isolation ‘connecting’ has been the driving force of the project, whether it is linking one art form to another or linking people. It’s been about meeting new people, feeling part of a group, enjoying the diversity of each other’s imagination and talents, tapping into our own creativity and most importantly having fun!
Quotes from participants

Warm feeling today, going back in time, being part of a group instead of being lonely. 
​
It brightened up my week from the plod, plod of Lockdown. -- Jenifer Kirby
It made me realise how much I’ve been missing fun creative activities. -- Janet Koralambe
It was a great privilege to work with real and talented artists. -- Christine Laschet
 
Words from the artists:
It was wonderful to see locked-down minds opening up and connecting with each other, and a joy to see so many smiles beaming back.
-- 
Hilary Greatorex
 
I’ve run several projects on Zoom over the last year but this did things differently and more ambitiously - connecting a wide-range of people across the county, and bringing people who are isolated, lonely or simply cheesed-off into the Wonderful Beast family and friends!
-- Dean Parkin
We are currently working on creating an online gallery showing all the wonderful creative work – wishes, poems, stories, recordings - that emerged inspired by the sessions.
 
Selected recorded material from all the sessions will be edited to create a short documentary of the whole project. ​
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23/12/2020 0 Comments

WISHING YOU A COSY CHRISTMAS AND A HOPEFUL NEW YEAR

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2020...many of us will be glad to see the back of it. But there have been good times and bad, and for the team at Wonderful Beast, the challenges presented by this year have led to some unexpected and great things (Lockdown Tales, in particular), and some fabulous new connections. To see some of the highlights, and to find out about what we've got lined up for next year, take a look at our Annual Report in brief, which you can find here.

Hoping you all have the best Christmas possible, and here's to a much, much better 2021. See you in the New Year.

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3/12/2020 0 Comments

wonderful beast at first light festival: winter solstice

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A digital celebration of the winter solstice and festive season, streamed into your living room on 20th December!

First Light Festival presents ‘Winter Solstice’: an invitation to stay in good heart and look to the new year.  As the year turns, the winter solstice heralds the restarting cycle of the seasons, reminding us that winter is not forever and life continues.  Although it marks the shortest day, the solstice is also a time for renewal.  The First Light community will be reunited virtually, as we enjoy storytelling, music and dance as we dream of being together on the beach next summer.

Wonderful Beast is bringing  its own special contribution to the festival with a filmed storytelling performance from Hilary Greatorex, with music by Sylvia Hallett. Find out How Night Came From the Sea with the help of a Sea Serpent, in  this beautiful Brazilian folktale.

​You'll be able to watch the event live here via Facebook (you won't need an account as it's a public event).
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1/12/2020 0 Comments

The Cattle Are Lowing

A little bit of musical relief for you all. After months of Zoom singing, and before the second Lockdown, members of the Wonderful Beast Singers thankfully gather in a Suffolk cowshed as darkness falls, to sing together whilst a fire crackles, bats swoop and circle, and Rob Gildon coaxes the group into a more musical rendition of ‘Steal Away’.

Coming up on December 18th, a socially distanced  outdoor Christmas Sing in the same cowshed at 3.00pm. For more details contact info@wonderfulbeast.co.uk . Newcomers welcome. 
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    Alys Kihl, Founder and Artistic Director of Wonderful Beast.

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