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Performances – Theatre, Concerts, Poetry, Dance . . .

Kemps Men Morris - Dance at Shandy Hall - May Day 2019

Morris dancing at Shandy Hall

Kemp’s Men of Norwich (named in honour of Will Kemp, colleague of Shakespeare, fellow shareholder in the Globe Theatre, Europe’s most famous comic actor and Morris dancer extraordinary) danced in Shandy Hall gardens, Bank Holiday Monday 27th May 2019

Then everyone joined in!

 

Commemoration for the 250th anniversary of Laurence Sterne's death - 2018

Where genius, wit, and humour sleep with Sterne?

A commemorative event in the church where Laurence Sterne’s funeral took place, to mark the 250th anniversary of Laurence Sterne’s death & subsequent funeral at St George’s, Hanover Square London.

Proceedings began at 7:30pm in the church where Laurence Sterne’s funeral took place 250 years ago:

St Georges Church, Hanover Square, London

Funeral biscuits and drinks were provided.

Funeral procession Mourners and Weepers included:

The Reverend Richard Coles

David Owen Norris

The Hilliard Ensemble

Susanne Heinrich

Patrick Hughes

Carmen Troncoso

Supported by Arts Council England

Jaap Blonk - celebrates the Dada Centennial (Different Voices series) 2016

Dada 100 years

Jaap Blonk and the Ursonate

Jaap Blonk Ursonate
Jaap Blonk Ursonate

Jaap Blonk (born 1953 in Woerden, Holland) is a self-taught composer, performer and poet. He went to university for mathematics and musicology.

In the late 1970s he took up saxophone and started to compose music. A few years later he discovered his potential as a vocal performer, at first in reciting poetry and later on in improvisations and his own compositions.

For almost two decades the voice was his main means for the discovery and development of new sounds.

As a vocalist, Jaap Blonk is unique for his powerful stage presence and almost childlike freedom in improvisation, combined with a keen grasp of structure.

He has performed around the world, on all continents.

This poetry/performance event will include Jaap Blonk’s performance of the Ursonate by Kurt Schwitters.

Time: 7:30pm Medical Society Rooms, Stonegate, York

This event is supported by Arts Council England

Maura Dooley and Ian Duhig - poetry from their new collections (Different Voices series) 2016

Acclaimed poets Maura Dooley & Ian Duhig read from their newly published collections The Silvering and The Blind Roadmaker. Both titles Poetry Book Society Recommendations in 2016

Maura Dooley’s collections of poetry include Life Under Water and the anthology she edited The Honey Gatherers: Love Poems. She has twice been short-listed for the TS Eliot Award and twice for the Forward Single Poem Prize. She teaches at Goldsmiths, London University and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. Her new collection, The Silvering is a Poetry Book Society Recommendation.  

‘This deceptively delicate, often very tender poet: how she marries spare lyrical cadences with political scepticism, packing a whole gamut of wit and sharp observation into very little space.’- Ruth Padel, Financial Times

Ian Duhig was born in London of Irish Catholic parents, and now lives in Leeds. His jobs included managing York City Council’s single homeless services before he became involved in writing full-time. Named as one of the Poetry Book Society’s New Generation poets, he won the National Poetry Competition twice, in 1987 and 2001, and the Forward Prize for Best Poem in 2001. His work has three times been shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize. His new book The Blind Roadmaker is a Poetry Book Society Recommendation.

“If the starting point for a number of poems in Ian Duhig’s richly varied new collection is Sterne’s Tristram Shandy, its presiding genius is the great eighteenth-century civil engineer, fiddler and polymath Blind Jack Metcalf – whose life Duhig here celebrates, and from whose example he draws great inspiration . . . No poet today writes with such a sense of political and social conscience.” Picador Poetry

Supported by Arts Council England

Richard Boothby plays Carl Friedrich Abel, Frances Spalding reads Virginia Woolf‘s Death of a Moth

A Moth Anthology - a Multimedia performance 2015

20 February 2015 at 7.30pm

Rymer Auditorium, Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall, University of York

The Laurence Sterne Trust at Shandy Hall presented an evening of sound and image drawing inspiration from the nocturnal world of moths.

With music from the 18th – 21st century

David Owen Norris – Square Piano

Richard Boothby – music of Carl Friedrich Abel, on the Viola da Gamba

Michiyo Takano – Koto music

Reading of Virginia Woolf’s Death of a Moth by Professor Frances Spalding

Haiku by Billy Collins, Maura Dooley and Roger Keyes.

Including students from the University of London, Goldsmiths College and Yamanashi Prefectural University, Kofu, Japan

Funded by Arts Council England

Ian Duhig - Poetry reading 2014

Ian Duhig
Ian Duhig

Digressions is a site-specific art and poetry project based around Shandy Hall where Laurence Sterne wrote The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman. The project began in 2013 (the tercentenary of Sterne’s birth) and finishes this autumn with the publication of a book of artwork, poetry and prose also called Digressions.

About Ian Duhig

Ian Duhig writes about the project

Review of Digressions

Joz Norris - Awkward Prophet 2014

Joz Norris
Joz Norris

Awkward Prophet – They say the moment before you die your life flashes before your eyes. Well, that’s true, but what they don’t tell you is that not only do you see your entire past, you also see all your possible futures – everything that could have been if things had turned out differently.

Joz Norris presents a kaleidoscopic and shambolic journey through his own mind, explaining every accident and naive decision that led him to where he is now, and indulging speculatively on just how things will turn out for him in the hope of finally deducing why he thinks burying a woman up to her neck in rocks is appropriate behaviour on a date.

“The audience loves every second…Norris is one to watch and a real talent for the future.” – The Skinny

“Quality moments of silliness…the kind of cheeky grin that was probably a hit with the dinner ladies.” – London is Funny

“One of the most exciting comic character creations on the up-and-coming comedy scene.” – Comedy Blogedy

“Actually pretty good.” – Terry Pratchett

“Norris’s comic ability is evidently present.” – Three Weeks

Joz Norris was born in 1989. His relative youth is still his major selling point. Due to a Robert Johnson-esque Faustian pact he made at a crossroads in the late 90s, he hasn’t aged in 15 years. He worked extensively in theatre and student films throughout his teens, setting up the No Answer Theatre Company to showcase local writing and acting talent in 2007. At the University of East Anglia he started dabbling in comedy and moved to London in 2011 to pursue it properly. He is an accomplished and acclaimed stand-up as well as being noted for his work as a character comic and on the clowning and cabaret circuit. To date he has written and performed two solo character shows, “Joz Norris is Matt Fisher: Uberperson” and “Joz Norris Has Gone Missing,” which was part of Time Out’s Top Ten Free Shows 2013 and Laugh Out London’s Pick of the Free Fringe as well as being Fringe Review’s Top Pick for the Blind Poet venue. He is now working on his next solo show, which will be his first non-character-based show, as well as working on several webseries which are in the early stages of development. He was the host of the student TV panel show “Punchlines” and is one half of the What Not Comedy Podcast with Karl Schultz.

 

Stephen Oxley - The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman - a one-man performance - 2013

Stephen Oxley as Tristram Shandy
Stephen Oxley as Tristram Shandy

Laurence Sterne’s birthday weekend was celebrated with Stephen Oxley’s unique one-man performance of Sterne’s famous novel, Tristram Shandy. Oxley plays the book’s eponymous hero, Tristram, who tells the story of his life with all of its riotous digressions. An unmissable historical stand-up performance.

“Hilarious – the first stand-up comic in English Literature” Sunday Express

“A virtuoso performance by Stephen Oxley” Scotsman

“An extraordinary reincarnation of the author and his characters” Independent

“Wittily and elegantly told” Times

Stephen Oxley trained at Rose Bruford College. His theatre work includes Don Juan in Don Juan for ATC, Abel’s Sister (Royal Court), View of Kabul (Bush), Macbeth (London Shakespeare Group), Tom & Viv and Betrayal (Millstream), Twelfth Night, The Jew of Malta, and The New Inn (RSC). Stephen has toured worldwide with his adaptation of Tristram Shandy.

St Helen Church, Stonegate, York. 7.30

Voice from the Pulpit - York Minister - 2013

 

Voice from the Pulpit – a special performance in the Quire of York Minster to celebrate the 300th anniversary of the birth of Laurence Sterne.

Voice from the Pulpit was a concert inspired by Sterne’s final sermon, ‘The Case of Hezekiah and the Messengers’ from 1764. The event featured the premiere performance of David Owen Norris’s new composition, ‘STERNE was the MAN’, written especially for Sterne’s tercentenary. The concert included period instruments, voice and four school choirs.

Voice from the Pulpit  included a reading of ‘The Case of Hezekiah and the Messengers’ by Sterne himself in the guise of Yorkshire-born actor David Bradley. Bradley is well-known for his roles in television and film including Harry Potter and starred as William Hartnell, the first Doctor Who actor in BBC Two drama ‘An Adventure in Space and Time’.

The four schools choirs were: Riverside Community Primary School, Tadcaster; Tadcaster Grammar School, Carlton Miniott Community Primary School, St Peter’s Brafferton. The choirs were coached by Choir Master Jonathan Brigg from the University of York.

Speaker: David Bradley
Tenor: Mark Wilde
Square Piano: David Owen Norris
The York String Quartet
Viola da Gamba: Susanna Pell
Natural Trumpet: Michael O’Farrell
Conductor: Jonathan Brigg

Performance starts at 7.30pm

Entrance via the South door from 7.00pm

Voice from the Pulpit was supported by Arts Council England

Choir of Jesus College Cambridge - Choral Concert - 2013

The Choir of Jesus College Cambridge directed by Mark Willams presents ‘A Choral Concert – Music from the British Isles from the Sixteenth Century to the Present Day’

Saturday 6 July 2013, 6.00pm

St Michael’s Church, Coxwold – FREE

There was a retiring collection in aid of Shandy Hall, home of Laurence Sterne (former student of Jesus College Cambridge), and Songbound, a charity with which the Choir of Jesus College has strong links and which aims to improve the lives of under-privileged children in India through music.

Jaap Blonk and The Ursonate - 2013

Lecture Theatre, Joseph Rowntree School, York

This poetry / performance event concentrated on Jaap Blonk’s performance of the Ursonate by Kurt Schwitters. Find out more about this unique work here.

Jaap is artist-in-residence at Shandy Hall for the last week of April and performed at the University of Leeds, Teesside University, Leamington Spa and London.

The performance at Joseph Rowntree Secondary School was by special request and lasted for approximately 45 mins – followed by questions.

Jaap Blonk (born 1953 in Woerden, Holland) is a self-taught composer, performer and poet.
He went to university for mathematics and musicology but did not finish those studies.
In the late 1970s he took up saxophone and started to compose music.

A few years later he discovered his potential as a vocal performer, at first in reciting poetry and later on in improvisations and his own compositions. For almost two decades the voice was his main means for the discovery and development of new sounds.

As a vocalist, Jaap Blonk is unique for his powerful stage presence and almost childlike freedom in improvisation, combined with a keen grasp of structure. He performed around the world, on all continents.

‘Jaap Blonk and the Ursonate’ is part of  the  Poetry by Heart Poetry, Memorisation and Performance programme which has been organised by the National Association of Writers in Education (NAWE) and is hosted by  the Laurence Sterne Trust and Joseph Rowntree Secondary School.

iShandy - York Theatre Royal - Tercentenary play

i-shandy York Theatre Royal
i-shandy York Theatre Royal

11th May 2013

New Play written for Laurence Sterne’s Tercentenary. Also a Theatre Royal Book Group and a Shandy Hall Visit and Theatre Trip. The actors all visited Shandy Hall.

Very loosely based on the novel by Laurence Sterne with footnotes, gratitude, savoury snacks and pregnant pauses.

Members of a teachers’ Book Club meet to discuss the latest ambitious read in their season of Yorkshire classics, the insurmountable Tristram Shandy.

It’s fun loving English teacher Susan’s turn to host and as always, she insists on an elaborate fancy dress theme. As the friends gather dressed as characters from the novel, excitement builds about meeting the group’s newest member. After all, he was the one who suggested Tristram Shandy in the first place!

However, this is no ordinary cosy night in with a good book as the evening takes some extraordinary twists and turns. As confusion mounts and hilarity ensues, the meeting descends into debauched absurdity and this cunning comedy becomes as saucy, surreal and dangerous as Sterne himself.

The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman is a novel by Coxwold based writer Laurence Sterne, released in nine volumes over seven years from 1759. There will be several associated events linked to this new production to help celebrate the 300th anniversary of Laurence Sterne’s birth.

Warning. This product may contain unavoidable nuts and other adult themes, including at least 17 verbal references to *******’s and a visual *!

 

A Cock and Bull Story - screening for Sterne Tercentenary 2013 -York City Screen

Cock and Bull Bryden Coogan
Cock and Bull Bryden Coogan

City Screen Picturehouse, York at 14.00

“To celebrate 300 years since the birth of Laurence Sterne, we have an introduction from Patrick Wildgust, curator of Shandy Hall.

Featuring a roll call of the great and the good of British comedy talent, Winterbottom’s (24 HOUR PARTY PEOPLE) adaptation of the essentially unfilmable novel, ‘The Life And Opinions Of Tristram Shandy’, is a pure joy.

It brings to mind Charlie Kaufman’s ADAPTATION in that it is really about the making of the film you are watching.

Coogan plays both Shandy and his father Walter, with Brydon cast as Shandy’s unfortunate uncle.

They move in and out of the film-within-the-film, preening and bickering on screen and off in a hugely enjoyable clash of egos.

True to the spirit of the original, Winterbottom holds a candle to the creative process and lifts the curtain on the movie-making business in all its self-important glory.”

Text by City Screen Picturehouse, York

David Owen Norris - Sterne and the Square Piano - 2012

 

Square piano
Square piano

A concert with David Owen Norris on a Square Piano of 1781 by Christopher Ganer – similiar to the Zumpe Piano that Sterne gave to Eliza Draper for her journey to India.

The performance included examples of eighteenth-century songs from the collection at Shandy Hall – these were their first modern performances – sung by Fiona Hymns and Jessica Gillingwater, students of the Royal Northern College of Music

The programme included music specifically designed for the Square Piano by Carl Friedrich Abel.

Ticket holders were invited to spend the afternoon in Shandy Hall gardens (with a picnic) and the exhibition ‘Eliza Draper – An Absent Presence’ was open in the gallery.

St. Michael’s Church, Coxwold. 6.30pm

Part of the Precious Cargo project.

Coope, Boyes and Simpson - Hope Shortens all Journies - 2012

Hope shortens All Journeys
Hope Shortens all Journeys

A welcome return visit to St Michael’s Church, Coxwold by Coope, Boyes and Simpson where they performed a selection of songs traditional and contemporary, set against the story of Laurence Sterne’s relationship with Eliza Draper.

Hope Shortens all Journies tells the story of an affair of the heart, a series of intimate letters, a locket and a sea voyage from England to India in 1767.  This collaboration between the Laurence Sterne Trust, Georgina Boyes and the group continues an exploration into music and text that resulted in Songs of Freedom and Oppression.  

‘Dark & Stormy’ (Rum and ginger wine) was served in the interval.

Part of the Precious Cargo project.

The exhibition Eliza Draper : Absent Presence will be open in the gallery at Shandy Hall before the concert.

Concert began at 7.30pm

The Digital Opera Ensemble - A Sentimental Journey - 2012

A Sentimental Journey
A Sentimental Journey

March 2012
7.45pm with a 2.00pm matinee (Thu) York Theatre Royal

A Sentimental Journey is a digital opera for a mixed ensemble of technologies, remote audiences and live performers. It is inspired by Laurence Sterne’s novel, first published in 1768.

The work was performed live to the theatre audience, and streamed to hundreds of people around the world, who reported back with photos and postcards of their sentimental journeys. The end result was a shared experience between the audience(s), the performers, the music, the book, and the collective imagination.

Created in association with the Laurence Sterne Trust.

Each performance included a post show discussion and was streamed live at The Sentimental Journey website.

Eugen Gomringer - the father of concrete poetry, at Shandy Hall - 2011

Eugen Gomringer
Eugen Gomringer

The celebrated artist Eugen Gomringer (born 1925) will be visited the UK in September 2011. Gomringer spent a lifetime immersed in the creation of text based work, concrete poetry and minimalist art, as well as publishing, editing and curating. This was  a rare opportunity to see and hear examples of his work.

Reading and presentation by Gomringer, together with informal conversation at Shandy Hall. With guided tours of the Hall and lunch at Coxwold Village Hall. Also viewing the exhibition ‘The Emblem of My Work‘, celebrating the 250th anniversary of the marbled page in ‘Tristram Shandy’ featuring works from international artists and writers.

A £15 charge for the day included lunch, admission to the Gomringer reading, guided tour of the museum and entry to the exhibition and gardens.

HC Productions - Laurence Sterne on Stage - 2011

HC productions Sterne on stage
HC productions Sterne on stage

HC Productions present: Laurence Sterne on Stage

A Sentimental Journey & Tristram Shandy

Mister Macaroni and his bungling troupe of players came to Coxwold for a highly entertaining evening of Georgian comedy: Laurence Sterne’s major works, A Sentimental Journey & Tristram Shandy as you’d never seen them before.

In A Sentimental Journey we follow the absent minded, and easily distracted, Parson Yorick as he encounters an assortment of lords, ladies and chamber maids in his travels through France and Italy. Things get complicated: he forgets that England is at war with France, he doesn’t have a passport and he finds himself stranded in a storm in the mountains . . .

Tristram Shandy introduces us to the love story of Captain Toby Shandy and the Widow Wadman.  Just how serious is the Captain’s war wound, and will it influence the outcome of his – amours?

Founded in 1988 HC Productions built a reputation for staging colourful productions with a strong 18th Century flavour. The Company has performed at the Newcastle Comedy Festival, the Edinburgh Fringe and toured extensively in Germany featuring at the International Shakespeare Festival in Neuss.

Christian Bok - Residency and Performances - 2011

Christian Bok performing
Christian Bok performing

Christian Bok (Professor of English at the University of Calgary) is perhaps best known in the UK as the author of Eunoia (Coach House Books, 2001) which became a bestseller. This delightful and astonishing work of experimental literature won the Griffin Prize for Poetic Excellence. He has also earned many accolades for his virtuoso performances of sound poetry (particularly the Ursonate by Kurt Schwitters).

His current project is The Xenotext Experiment which will involve the encoding of a short verse into a sequence of DNA in order to implant it into a bacterium, after which Christian plans to document the progress of the experiment for publication.

His visit to England was singled out for particular mention on Ian McMillan’s The Verb.

During his stay as artist-in-residence at Shandy Hall, Christian gave two talks – on 19 May at the University of York and on 23 May at the University of Northumbria.

Both talks free of charge.

Coope Boyes & Simpson - Voice of the People: Ralph Vaughan Williams and Folksong - 2010

Coope Boyes and Simpson - Voice of the People
Coope Boyes and Simpson – Voice of the People

Voice of the People: Ralph Vaughan Williams and Folksong
Coope Boyes & Simpson, Fi Fraser, Jo Freya, Georgina Boyes

Voices ringing out in the frosty air or echoing in atmospheric
candlelight are the most evocative sounds of Christmas.  ‘I love a carol,’ said Vaughan Williams.

In the decade before the First War, Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) discovered a source of melody and an approach to music that inspired compositions throughout the rest of his career.   During summers spent in cottages, village pubs and gypsy camps from Essex and Surrey to North Yorkshire and Herefordshire, Vaughan Williams recorded around eight hundred songs and tunes that underlie orchestral works like Norfolk Rhapsody, Fantasia on Greensleeves and the English Folk Song Suite and were the sources of tunes in The English Hymnal and The
Oxford Book of Carols.  Folksong was, he wrote, ‘the voice of the people’ beautiful in itself and which has in it the germs of great art.’

Voice of the People brought together Coope Boyes and Simpson, whose innovative acappella arrangements of folksongs collected by Vaughan Williams have already won international acclaim and Classic FM Christmas favourites Fi Fraser, Jo Freya and Georgina Boyes in a specially written words and music production. Songs Vaughan Williams noted from the countryside are interlinked with his characteristically perceptive descriptions to give a first-hand account of this exciting period in English music. It’s a rare opportunity to hear the original sources of some of the composer’s best-loved music for concert hall and church, as well as lesser known songs and carols he collected across England.

Coope, Boyes and Simpson have been nominated for Best Group and Best Album at the 2011 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards.

–highly recommended – entertaining, educational, funny and some great singing!-

BBC Radio 2 Folk & Acoustic website

–six of the nation’s finest singing voices’ Shreds & Patches

Supported by The Heritage Lottery Fund.

Patrick Wildgust and Susan Heinrich - Mr Abel's Fine Airs & Mr Sterne's Fine Writings - 2010

Susanne Heinrich
Susanne Heinrich

The recitals, at Coxwold Church and at Harewood House, concentrated on viola da gamba music of the 18th century composed by Carl Friedrich Abel.

Pieces were selected and performed appropriate to the mood and the occasion. The recital wase an improvisation to the Story of Le Fever from Laurence Sterne’s Tristram Shandy.

Both Sterne (who played the gamba) and Abel were exponents of sensibility and in one of the composer’s obituaries it is recorded: The death of Abel occasions a great loss to the musical world. Sensibility is the prevailing and beautiful characteristic of his compositions. He was the Sterne of Music – the one wrote and the other composed to the soul.

‘Abel’s pieces are reminiscent of J S Bach’s solo cello suites, so if you like them then you’ll like these… (BBC)

Supported by The Heritage Lottery Fund.

Kim Rosenfield and Rob Fitterman - Poetry by New York Poets 2010

Rosenfield Fitterman poster
Rosenfield Fitterman poster

7- 8pm Monday 16 August

The 2010 summer’s poet-in-residence at Shandy Hall, Coxwold was co-organised by Information as Material and the Laurence Sterne Trust.

Shandy Hall, Coxwold, the former home of the celebrated 18th-century English writer Laurence Sterne (author of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman), is a museum dedicated to exploring his astounding and continuing influence on the arts. -Through exhibitions, and by hosting residency programmes, it explores how contemporary artistic practice, whether text-based, visual, sonic or otherwise, can help visitors to the museum unlock the Trust’s collection of 18th and 19th-century literature, said the museum’s curator, Patrick Wildgust. – Our aim is to encourage an inventive exploration of Sterne’s legacy and experimental spirit, in the context of the artefacts of his estate. The outcome of Kim Rosenfield’s and Rob Fitterman’s visit was  featured in The Perverse Library exhibition (04 September -31 October 2010, Shandy Hall, Coxwold). The exhibition unfolds around Professor Craig Douglas Dworkin’s personal library of 2427 titles.

Kim Rosenfield was taken up by the LA poets (Dennis Cooper et al.) when she was only 17 years old and they published her first book of poetry ‘Some of Us’ to widespread critical acclaim. As the literary critic Julian Spahr described her recent book Good Morning-Midnight-

“For those trying to understand the relation between innovative writing and feminism, Kim Rosenfield’s  Good Morning-Midnight- is required reading. Rosenfield samples with artful and humorous juxtaposition the languages of science, money and fashion so as to critique how they define and limit women.”

Rob Fitterman has been teaching poetry at NYU for years and is renowned for his radical writing which includes books such as Rob the Plagiarist. Craig Dworkin said the following about his book:

“As we know from Jack Torrance, who typed an entire manuscript of the one repeated, plagiarized line: all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy. With Fitterman, a plagiarist extraordinaire, we have all the play and all the work together in some of the smartest and sharpest textual interventions yet.”

They are two of the most radical exciting performers on the American poetry circuit and regularly perform at the legendary Bowery Poetry Club in Manhattan, New York City. They were delighted to be performing at Artspace in York and looked forward to presenting an evening of extreme poetry.

Easingwold Silver Band - 2009

The opening of an exhibition of the maps of J.L.Carr in this year was celebrated with a performance by the Easingwold Silver Band.

Because J.L. Carr was a Wesleyan Methodist, it was felt appropriate to have Methodist hymn tunes drifting through the grounds whilst visitors were enjoying the maps in the gallery. The beautiful music was appreciated, not only by the guests, but by the neighbouring cows, who strolled across the fields, and stood looking over the garden wall, entranced.

Rohan Kriwaczek, Funerary Violin - 2009

Rohan Kriwaczek
Rohan Kriwaczek

In 2009 we celebrated the 250th anniversary of Vols I & II of Tristram Shandy by Laurence Sterne.

We celebrated the birth of this book perversely with a funerary theme, as Page 73 of Volume I is a Black Page which marks the death of Parson Yorick..

At the launch of our Black Page celebrations, Rohan Kriwaczek played funerary violin at the grave of Laurence Sterne in Coxwold.

Funeral Biscuits were served.

 

Pavlo Beznosiuk - Bach's Lyre - 2007

Concert by Pavlo Beznosiuk in St. Michael’s Church, Coxwold.

Coope, Boyes & Simpson - Songs of Freedom and Oppression - 2007

Perfomed in St Michael’s Church, Coxwold, following on from our project ‘A Bitter Draught: the Starling and Slavery”  heralding the 200th anniversary of Parliments abolition of the slave trade in 2007, and part of the Ilkley Literature Festival.

Some songs from this show now released on CD ‘As if . . . ‘

 

Coope, Boyes & Simpson - On Flander's Fields - 2007

On Flanders Fields takes its name from the poem written by John McCrae who was killed near Ypr’s in the First War. Written and compiled by Coope Boyes and Simpson, the production is a tribute to lives caught up in the War to end all Wars. It brings together the humour of the soldiers on the Western Front who contributed to the famous Trench magazine, The Wipers Times, the poetry which turned experience of ‘the pity of war’ into a lasting memorial and – most evocative of all – music of the time and specially commissioned songs.

Combining words and music for In Flanders Fields is particularly significant. Soldiers sang as they marched to the Front, pianos and gramophones were given a place in the deepest German trenches, enemies joined in carol singing during the Truce of Christmas 1914 – it was called ‘The Ragtime War’. Haunting and irreverent, these songs catch the indestructible spirit that defied one of the greatest human tragedies of the twentieth century.

 

Coope, Boyes & Simpson - Voices at the Door - 2006

Coope, Boyes & Simpson, Fi Fraser, Jo Freya and Georgina Boyes – Midwinter Songs and Carols: A words and music programme of regional and historical carols. St. Michael’s Church, Coxwold.