Once upon a time there was a storytelling festival in the little town of Harvard, where people gathered together to laugh and learn and cry. Then the storytellers went away, and for years the town had no stories and everyone was sad. Now, on Saturday, Oct. 1, a magician named Fivesparks is bringing back a whole day of storytelling: At STORYfest, people young and old can go from place to place hearing tales, telling stories of their own, seeing friends, laughing, crying. And the town will be happy again.
Many remember the Three Apples Storytelling Festival, an annual weekend event popular in the 1980s and early ’90s. Professional storytellers held audiences rapt at various locations, and amateurs gathered on the Common to tell their own stories. For years, Fivesparks has wanted to bring back a storytelling festival, and this year’s STORYfest is a beginning.
Cary Browse, Fivesparks board member and this year’s co-organizer of the Oct.1 STORYfest, along with Willie Wickman, recalled what an incredible experience Three Apples was for the whole family. It was a wonderful way to meet people and to give the kids exposure to great storytelling, she said. STORYfest will bring those same opportunities to the community. “Storytelling,” said Wickman, “broadens your view of humanity.”
STORYfest will feature five professional storytellers, with a variety of subjects and styles for families and adults (12 years and up). The daylong event will begin at 9 a.m. in the Unitarian Universalist Church at the top of the Common. All performers will tell a tale, giving people a chance to get the flavor of each. Then the day is divided up, with different storytellers at the church, the UU Fellowship Building, Fivesparks, and the Common. Lunch of chili and cornbread will be for sale at the Fellowship Building. On the Common, story swaps will be going on all day, each session hosted by one of the professionals, with community members of all ages encouraged to spin stories of their own. Family ghost stories and an adult cabaret will be evening entertainment. (See fivesparks.org for a complete schedule.)
Two of the storytellers met in Harvard at a Three Apples festival in the 1990s, and they performed in a recent program at Fivesparks. Joey Talbert came to storytelling through preschool teaching. In an earlier interview she recalled being mesmerized listening to a professional storyteller who came to her classroom and how excited she was to realize “that’s a thing—you can be a storyteller.” Talbert spoke of Jim LaChapelle as “magical, like a wandering bard who pops in to tell an epic tale of dragons, kings, and knights. He has a wonderful face that lights up when he becomes the characters in his story and a delightful way with language.”
Simon Brooks is a British storyteller and humorist who believes in the great power of the ancient stories—folk and fairy tales, myths and legends—that can be both funny and poignant. He is committed to keeping the art of storytelling alive. Rona Leventhal is a storyteller whose multicultural and personal tales are informed by her roles as educator and specialist in improvisational theater and movement. Judging from his website, Tony Toledo’s humor is somewhat self-deprecating. He describes himself as, among other things, a professional pie taster and writes: “His massive one-tenth of an acre estate has just room for his wife’s basil, his books, and their Corn Museum.”
One special event of the festival will be the 5 p.m. “Teens A Tellin’” upstairs at the General Store. Joey Talbert will hold a workshop on Sept. 25 for kids in grades 6 to 9, working with them on techniques to fully develop a character and encouraging them to express their unique perspectives. She has had the help of Harvard middle schooler Lena Aloise to organize the workshop. The students will have the chance to tell their stories developed in the workshop.
Wickman said it will take money and sponsorships to grow the festival, but Fivesparks board members are committed to expanding STORYfest and making it an annual event. Storytelling offers a perspective you wouldn’t get otherwise, said Wickman. And, as Browse said of Three Apples, it makes memories for the whole family.
Information about advance purchase of a day pass and tickets to evening events is online at fivesparks.org/arts-events/storyfest. Tickets for single events can be purchased at the door; the story swaps and original teen stories are free.
