Gales hit storytelling Odyssey

STORYTELLERS and musicians from Shetland and Corsica hope to fly into Fair Isle on Tuesday after poor weather put paid to plans for an international story telling event on Monday.

Shetland raconteur Lawrence Tulloch and Fair Isle singer Lise Sinclair joined Francette Orsoni and musician Carmin Belgodere for a sell out night of tale telling at Edinburgh’s Scottish Storytelling Centre, on Sunday night, as part of the Scottish International Storytelling Festival.

However when they flew up to Sumburgh on Monday they found themselves stranded on the mainland, the south easterly gales making it impossible to land on Fair Isle as planned.

Now the troupe, complemented by Davy Cooper from Mossbank, are waiting to see if the winds will ease enough for them to make it into the island for the second night planned at The Puffin.

Failing that, an opportunity to gather round the fire and hear yarns spun about island life in the far north and the warm south comes on Wednesday night at Da Böd in Hillswick.

The following day the performance will move to Mid Yell where a session will be held at the Mid Yell junior high school.

Lise Sinclair said she was disappointed not make it to her native isles on Monday, but she had not given up hope on recreating the successful night in Edinburgh, where she sang on Satu
rday as well, when Orcadian Tom Muir was joined by story tellers from Crete.
“I felt very honoured to sing for both Orkney and Shetland and both nights went really well, a lot of folk came up to me and said they had really enjoyed it,” she said.

Lawrence Tulloch said the Edinburgh event had been “very, very successful”, even though Francette Orsoni could not speak a word of English and it fell to his friend Alexa Fitzgibbon to step in and translate from the French.

“I was bit worried at the time because of the communication but it turned out to be absolutely brilliant, thanks to Alexa. And you could pretty well tell what she was saying without understanding a word. She is not what you would call static.”

Entry to both the Fair Isle and the Hillswick nights is £6/£4, which start at 7.30pm.
The 2011 Scottish Storytelling Festival is, appropriately enough, titled An Island Odyssey: Scotland and Old Europe with events across the country from Bute to Shetland.

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