Save the date and plans for the future

Thank you!​
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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​
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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.