A NEW
Tale to Tell The Storytelling Arts Center of the Southeast
By Lisa Canada
Using mime, poetry, song, humor and vivid characterizations, Len Cabral is a popular storyteller at festivals and theaters around the country and will be part of the Laurinburg festival April 26–27.
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here was a time when evenings were spent on the front porch or in the front room listening to a story. Maybe it was Grandma, maybe an uncle, or maybe someone else entirely. The only things that mattered were the story being told and the person telling it. Over time those stories were replaced by radio and then television and now the computer, too. And that generation of folks who could capture your imagination and take you to places far from your own piece of land has all but gone. But some of those stories still exist, and there are still people who tell them. Storytelling is back. “There’s been a resurgence not just in our country but across the world,” says Brenda Gilbert, a storyteller and one of the founders of the Storytelling Arts Center of the Southeast (SACS). It was this resurgence that Gilbert and SACS co-founder Jan Schmidt wanted to capture and carry to southeastern North Carolina and the entire Southeast. Schmidt, a former school librarian, and Gilbert, a retired school
30 MARCH 2008 Carolina Country
administrator, attended the national storytelling festival in Tennessee. Later they decided to try to acknowledge and build up what they knew already existed in the southeastern states: a love of and talent for storytelling. They founded SACS and kicked off the Storytelling Festival of Carolina, a spring event that brings national and regional storytellers together in Scotland County. “Our regional cultures and the stories they hold are too important—and too fun—to let pass away,” says Schmidt. Scotland County is one of the most racially balanced counties in the U.S. Ten percent of the county’s residents are Lumbee Indians, 40 percent are African Americans, and 50 percent are white. Remarkably, all three of these cultures—while historically very different—have storytelling traditions. Native Americans communicated history, genealogy and spirituality through songs, dance and spoken words. Scottish immigrants, the next wave of residents to settle the area, brought the European tradition of tales told through spoken words and song, in particular the ballad.
African slaves shared news, spiritual support, and advice for finding freedom through spoken words and songs. Protecting and celebrating these storytelling traditions are central to the mission of the Storytelling Arts Center of the Southeast: to preserve and enrich storytelling arts for all ages through performances, research, workshops and writing. The Storytelling Arts Center provides a venue for Youthful Voices, based on a national program that promotes storytelling as an art form for children. SACS also sponsors a regional Storytelling Guild and has started collecting oral histories. Nationally known storytellers associated with the center include Donald Davis, Diane Ferlatte, Len Cabral and Jay O’Callahan. Regional tellers include Tyris Jones, Brenda Gilbert, Gwen Rainer and Kat Littleturtle.
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The 2nd annual Storytelling Festival of Carolina will be held at the Historic John Blue House in Laurinburg April 26–27. The house is at 13040 X-Way Road, Laurinburg, NC 28352. For more information call (910) 291-0929.