Hello!
So here we are back in the tiny white box after another day full of Stoff. Chris is so tired he just mentioned a show we saw yesterday and didn’t believe me when I told him it was this afternoon. At festivals days do tend to blur together though don’t they, well this one is no exception.
We walked a bit too far out of our way in search of breakfast this morning and ended up having to get a boat back to somewhere more familiar, which worked out nicely in the end because we got to go on a boat. By the time we got back to the old town we needed more than a coffee and a cinnamon swirl so we had some lunch outside at a lovely restaurant in Gamla Stan’s main square.
We then made our way to the theatre, and watched the shows divided between the Kulterhuset-Horsalen which is the big theatre space where we’re doing our show tomorrow and the KulturhusTaket- a stage on the roof which is an incredible place to be even in between shows, especially when the sun’s out.
We then made our way to another part of the city where the other Stoff venue is, to see Nick Field who we’d met earlier in the week. I’ll let Chris say something about this if he can remember which day of the week it was on (it was definitely tonight).
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Yes, it was very definitely tonight – I’m sure of that one! Nick Field was performing The Cosmos, The Cosmetics, for which he already has some glowing reviews under his belt. I’m not often a fan of spoken word performances – I guess sometimes I feel a little bit like I could have read the text in a book and it might have had just as much impact. But with Nick (and I’m sure this is the case with a good number of other spoken word artists out there), his emotion, charisma and authenticity really shine through, and this makes for a believable, humbling and enjoyable experience. The text is full of imagery – the initial words build a clear picture of a young boy riding through the streets of his home village, and we are immediately with him in the story, clinging to every word. No doubt the words that Nick has written would still be interesting, moving, relatable and funny if we read them on a sheet of paper, but what really makes them fly is the intimate, confident and relaxed style in which they are delivered. A thoroughly enjoyable performance, and a great audience too.
Also, I’d like to quickly mention Discredited Dentistry by Joseph Tepperman from the USA. This took place on the rooftop stage and was a catalogue of the possible stories behind thirty-two statues from a Canadian sculpture garden. The performance demonstrated great use of audio cassette recordings – and I do love to see a cassette player in show!
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Oh is that what that was? Anyway, time for us to go to bed. We have to be at the theatre nice and early tomorrow so we’re ready for when we get called in to do our tech. The show is at 6, so we’ll have all day to get nice and nervous. Thank you for reading!
Lots of love,
DC
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