Tag Archives: Storytelling

Storytelling- Open Mic Mondays

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This is an ongoing monthly series of storytelling open mics that will take place on the 3rd Monday of the month.

Here’s how it works:
Up to 10 Tellers. 10 minutes each. Any style- traditional, personal, braided. etc. Sign-up will be first come, first serve.

Doors at 6:30, show at 7pm. Please do not park on Hennepin Ave before 6pm as you will get towed!

This event presented in partnership of Story Arts of Minnesota and the American School of Storytelling.

Check out our ‘Getting Here’ page for parking information.

Storytelling- Open Mic Mondays

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Welcome to the launch of our new in-person storytelling open mic series! This is the first of an ongoing monthly series of storytelling open mics that will take place on the 3rd Monday of the month.

Here’s how it works:
Up to 10 Tellers. 10 minutes each. Any style- traditional, personal, braided. etc. Sign-up will be first come, first serve.

Doors at 6:30, show at 7pm. Please do not park on Hennepin Ave before 6pm as you will get towed!

This event presented in partnership of Story Arts of Minnesota and the American School of Storytelling.

Check out our ‘Getting Here’ page for parking information.

Circus Rex

Circus Rex Book Launch

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“Circus Rex” coming Friday, September 29th!

1762 Hennepin Ave South, Minneapolis, MN
Doors at 6:30, show at 7pm

Join us (Christine and Loren) for a celebration of “Circus Rex” (after 40 years of stories, 20 years and 9 versions in the writing, it’s finally making its way in the world) with bbq, beer, and books.

Oh and stories from Kevin Kling and myself of the journey from the headwaters of the Mississippi to New Orleans that was the source material of this “memoir” gone off the rails replete with carny come-on’s, poetic imagery, and off-beat humor.

Cover art by Michael Sommers

Seeking an Audience

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by Christine Mounts ~ September 3, 2023

While wandering the Minnesota State Fair conducting our annual folklore tour, Dr. Buzz’s State Fair Odyssey, we made a stop at the 12:30pm Arts A’Fair performance of the Black Storytellers Alliance. Being the last show, at lunchtime, and in the heat of the day, only two performers told stories under the foliage of the East Grandstand Plaza. But it was a real treat to see their performance.

If you missed the Black Storytellers Alliance at The Fair, you can see them perform by attending the 33rd Annual Black Masters Storytellers Festival on September 28-30, 2023.

Master Storyteller Vusumuzi Zulu tells a traditional story at the Minnesota State Fair Arts A'Fair
Master Storyteller Vusumuzi Zulu tells a traditional story at the Minnesota State Fair Arts A’Fair

Afterward, as our Founder Loren Niemi chatted with Master Storyteller Vusumuzi Zulu, I made my way around the gathered audience, circling the plaza with some promo materials and asked what I thought would be an easy question: “Are you interested in storytelling?” For ¾ of the people sitting on the benches in the shade, with corn and beer in hand, the answer was “no.”

OK, so maybe the State Fair is not the best place to find an audience for storytelling. To be fair to The Fair, the East Grandstand Plaza was a better location than the North End Event Center, which was a place of blazing sun and no seating last year. But I continue to be astounded by the lack of interest or understanding of this artform.

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Pam Faro “Uncle Olaus Survives the Titanic”

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The dramatic true story of Pam’s great-uncle who was one of the few 3rd-class male passengers to survive the tragedy. A richly-layered story of immigration, adventure, homesteading, friendship, family, and survival you won’t soon forget.

Thursday, September 14 @ 7pm on the 1762 Hennepin Stage. For ages 10 to adult.

Teller Bio:

Colorado storyteller and teaching artist Pam Faro has spent the past 35 years exploring how storytelling connects people across boundaries, spreads light, and lifts hearts and spirits – needed now more than ever! She invites you right in with warmth and depth, whether she’s telling a bilingual cuento, an intriguing personal story, an historical epic, or multicultural folktales.

To register:

  1. Add the number of tickets you want by clicking the ‘+’ button
  2. Click the ‘Get Tickets’ button.

Doctor Buzz’s State Fair Odyssey 2023

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Saturday morning August 26 starting at 10 AM.

We’ll meet outside the Hamline Dining Hall. We’re indulging in Al’s Breakfast before the tour. Join us if you are hungry!

Yes, Loren Niemi, the Flounder, takes you on a walk of the things strange and stranger he has come to love about the MN State Fair: Butterhead sculptures, seed crop art, Stiechen’s store, Ye Olde MIll, food on a stick, and more. Crafts, animal barns, gizmo demonstrations, and of course, the great swirl of populace come for the great MN Get-together.

$10 for the tour but you will also need to pay admission and whatever you want to spend once you’re there. 

To register:

  1. Add the number of tickets you want by clicking the ‘+’ button
  2. Click the ‘Get Tickets’ button.

First Night

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by Christine Mounts ~ August 20, 2023

“What is going on here?”- a question posed by an upstairs neighbor to some of our guests who had spilled out the front door of “First Night”, the grand opening of the American School of Storytelling on Friday August 18, 2023.

The official answer is “storytelling” or more accurately “nothing new” since storytelling is an ancient artform, indeed the Mother Art. But perhaps it’s new to our neighbors or at least “something different”- an intimate performance venue dedicated to the oral narrative arts of storytelling, poetry, and singer-songwriters.

Not theater because there is no fourth wall separating us from the audience. Not a poetry open mic at the bar on Wednesday to draw in patrons. Not the storytelling slam model that The Moth Radio Hour is renowned for. Not a writing program, not a marketing buzzword, or a gathering of liars, unless you believe fiction to be a lie despite its ability to tell the truth, often better than facts.

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Jim Stowell

Jim Stowell “Rio Bravo / Rio Grande Part 2”

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This is the second of four performances of the essential Jim Stowell autobiographical stories. Each show is unique and can be enjoyed independently of the others. 

Many of these stories have not been performed in a decade or more. “Rio Bravo / Rio Grande” part 2 continues the lives and times of living on the border, in McAllen, Texas with all the complications of guns, grit and immigration.

These stories evoke the deep moral and cultural heart of the Rio Grande Valley of Texas. Each of these stories is filled with the sights, smells and sounds of a landscape so alien, yet so familiar, that you would swear you are traveling in the territory of myth, where everybody’s stories mingle and mesh. Echoes from just about anybody’s childhood can be heard deep in the heart of these stories. But at the same time these adolescent adventures are so distinctly Texan, and so utterly pure, that they conjure a hot and dusty world of their own.

See “Rio Bravo / Rio Grande” part 2, Saturday, November 11 @ 7pm on the 1762 Hennepin Stage.

Rio Bravo / Rio Grande Reviews:

Jayne Blanchard Saint Paul Pioneer Press. “Jim Stowell’s Rio Bravo! Rio Grande! stories are so enrapturing that you feel like those cartoon characters lifted off their feet and floating through the air on the wavy wafts of some luscious aroma. Rio Bravo! examines the sunbaked memories of what he calls, ‘memory geography.’ The memories start gleefully but as boyhood moves into restless adolescence Stowell notices the unspoken truth of what separates once inseparable friends.”

Teller Bio:

Learn more at Jim Stowell’s website

A professional actor, director, playwright and storyteller for around fifty years, Jim has written and directed eleven full cast plays. This includes two children’s plays, two adaptations, a Spanish language one-act and the book for a musical comedy, running somewhere in America for the last 17 years and produced three spinoffs.

Jim has written and performed twelve one man plays that were commissioned and produced by six different theaters in Minneapolis-Saint Paul. His work has also been performed in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Houston, in a big blue tent in Northern Wisconsin, an Art Center in Mexico, a theater in Guatemala, a school in Nicaragua, a banana plantation in Honduras and a jungle village in Brazil.

To register:

  1. Add the number of tickets you want by clicking the ‘+’ button
  2. Click the ‘Get Tickets’ button.
Hope is an Action Word

Bowen Lee “Hope is an Action Word”

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Climate crisis is not the new normal. It is a conflict that must be resolved, and each one of us can play a part in this resolution. Traditional stories can give us the keys to how we can accomplish this challenge. Current day examples of people reversing the adverse effects of climate change show us it is possible.

Climate Change Steward, Bowen Lee, will tell some tales to get you thinking, motivate and inspire you, and help you carry out your own climate change stewardship. Whether you are actively doing your best to help the planet, or wondering where to start, or not convinced anything needs to be done at all, you are invited to attend this evening of stories of hope and encouragement.

Saturday, October 28th at 7:00 PM in the 1762 Hennepin space. Tickets: Adults $10; Children 10-17, $5

Bowen Lee

Teller Bio:

Storyteller Bowen Lee is not a tree hugger and doesn’t recommend the practice unless you like splinters. She does listen to what trees can tell her, and they have some good stories to tell.  A West Coast storyteller  who has been an environmentalist and educator for nearly 40 years. Editor for the Storycology section of the StoryBeast digital magazine, and a member of Asian American Storytellers In Action, Artists Standing Strong Together, and the Storytelling Association of California. Bowen Lee has been a winner of story slams and grand slams for National Storytelling Network and Six Feet Apart, and has performed at the Bay Area Storytelling Festival, the Women’s Storytelling Festival, Settle Stories of the UK, and many libraries and museums.

To register:

  1. Add the number of tickets you want by clicking the ‘+’ button
  2. Click the ‘Get Tickets’ button.
Jim Stowell

Legendary Playwright Jim Stowell Four Performance Series

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A four performance series of the essential Jim Stowell autobiographical stories, many of which have not been performed in a decade or more. Tickets may be purchased for individual shows at $15 or $50 for the whole series.

2023 Shows:

September 9-“Rio Bravo / Rio Grande Part 1”

November 11-“Rio Bravo / Rio Grande Part 2”

“Rio Bravo / Rio Grande” parts 1 and 2 detail life and times of living on the border, in McAllen, Texas with all the complications of guns, grit and immigration.

2024 Shows:

March 9- “Talking Pictures” (on sale in 2024)

May 11- “Raspberry Island” (on sale in 2024)

“Talking Pictures” the third installment of this series brings us to Nicaragua and Cuba, while the fourth performance will provide a glimpse of Jim’s many years working for the US Forest Service and lessons learned at the lighthouse on Raspberry Island.

A professional actor, director, playwright and storyteller for around fifty years, Jim has written and directed eleven full cast plays, including two children’s plays, two adaptations, a Spanish language one-act and the book for a musical comedy that has been running somewhere in America for the last 17 years  and produced three spinoffs.

Jim has written and performed twelve one man plays that were commissioned and produced by six different theaters in Minneapolis-Saint Paul. His work has also been performed in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Atlanta, Houston, in a big blue tent in Northern Wisconsin, an Art Center in Mexico, a theater in Guatemala, a school in Nicaragua, a banana plantation in Honduras and a jungle village in Brazil.

To register:

  1. Add the number of tickets you want by clicking the ‘+’ button
  2. Click the ‘Get Tickets’ button.