THE MASTER DRIVE: The Collected Works of Odds Bodkin.
“A modern-day Orpheus” — BILLBOARD
Calendar
Upcoming Events, Shows & Performances:
A Mad Scramble
It was a mad scramble. In an email, two weeks out from Sept. 9, Professor Walsh, Chair of Classics at Loyola, wrote that campus conditions were “vexing.” He warned we might have to go with Zoom again due to sudden Delta variant rules. I already had my Southwest Airlines ticket. As always, I’d stay with my sister Lindsay outside Baltimore, drive to town the night of the show, perform the tale, and then go out to dinner with the profs.
For fifteen years I’d done this in September. I’d pack my 12-string and tell either The Odyssey or the Iliad: Book I for two hundred Classics and Honors students in a big performance space. 70-minute storytellings. Either psychodrama or high adventure.
But now there was an indoor mask mandate on campus, even if vaccinated. How could I perform with a mask on? That was patently impossible and so I wrote Professor Joe Walsh back with the suggestion that for the second year in a row, against our frustrated wishes, we could always Zoom from my studio in New Hampshire. I work with a brilliant digital engineer named Gavin Bodkin, who has helped his dad move online since the pandemic began. Yes, Gav was available to produce. Joe Walsh agreed. My Zoom studio on the third floor had sat unused during a summer of live shows.
The mad scramble began.
I tightened the twelve fresh strings on my Taylor from the floppy looseness I’d planned on for safe flying. I strung it up to the open tuning I use for The Odyssey. Gavin produced the Zoom invitation to be sent to the students from faculty. Five nice people from Loyola suddenly became involved and we exchanged a blizzard of emails. I provided an Odyssey logo.
And then I heard Martha was back from sabbatical and that she’d be the one to introduce me. Professor Martha Taylor is, I guess, now that she’s back, the Chair of Classics once again. It was she who, fifteen years ago, established the annual tradition of inviting me to perform to kick off each fall semester. It might be over Zoom, but it would be great to see her again after her two sabbatical years.
I started rehearsing the Odyssey musical score and on a drive to my son Jon’s house to return a pair of sandals I’d inadvertently swiped at a party there, I ran the movie of the story in my mind. Troy. The beach at Ismaros. The Lotus Eaters. The Cyclops. After a half hour out, and a half hour back, the story was rehearsed and ready.
Bless his heart, Gavin arrived at 4:30 for the 7 pm show, rested for an hour, and then we climbed the two flights of stairs to the studio. A jet black backdrop, a wooden chair, a quiet little fan, tried and true lighting, and the camera mounted in place two feet away from me. Last spring I conducted performances and full day residencies for elementary kids from that chair. I doubted I’d ever be back. The pandemic was over, right? Wrong, as we all now know.
By 6:35 Gavin was in his headphones watching the computer, seeing who was in the waiting room. Joe showed up on my screen and we talked until Martha, too, appeared. We chatted, lamented our lost profs’ dinner, and got ready for the show. More and more students were signing on.
Telling my version of The Odyssey is like entering a dream. The music is constant, and lofts the words and sounds along. Once it begins inside the Trojan Horse, it doesn’t end until the Cyclops is blinded, and Odysseus escapes with what’s left of his crew. During such shows, I lose all sense of time and awareness of my body. All that I’m aware of is my fingers running the frets of the guitar, and how the music is blending with the imagery. The characters all know what to say. Sometimes they surprise me, and say things I’ve never heard before.
This version ended up seventy-five minutes. Then came the questions. Suddenly, faces appeared in group mode on Zoom. Here were all these young people who’d just watched the show with me on full screen, only I could see them now. Groups of five or six on a couch, with masks on. Some alone in their dorm rooms. Hands went up. The questions? How did I memorize all that? Is the music all planned out? We went on for another fifteen minutes. They were enthusiastic and very nice.
I’m old. They’re young. Still, it worked.
Of course, the story is imagined, not memorized, and the music, like jazz, is spontaneous, moment to moment.
Even Martha loved it. She sent me a post-show email inviting me back for year sixteen.
So it looks as if until this plague really does end, I’m Zooming again.
https://www.oddsbodkin.net/educational-programs/
Odds Bodkin’s Live and Zoom Shows Now Booking for Fall 2021 and Winter 2022
Odds Bodkin’s Live and Zoom Shows for Are Now Booking for Fall 2021 and Winter 2022!
Fully vaccinated and delighted to be back performing for live audiences, storyteller and musician Odds Bodkin is now booking live assembly performances for K-12 schools in New England and beyond. Plus a host of other incredible offerings for adult audiences. All shows are also available on Zoom.
Last year, Loyola University Maryland opted for their annual Iliad/Odyssey performance via Zoom, and 200 Classics and Honors students tuned in. That was Odds’ 13th annual September show for Loyola. But this year, he’ll be flying down in person with his 12-string guitar to regale his college audience once again. That’s 14 years in a row!
Special thanks to Gavin Bodkin, Odds’ son, for building a Zoom studio for his dad and engineering a host of appearances during the pandemic. Full day GOLDEN RULE residences for elementary schools in Merrimack, NH, complete with custom workshops, were completed to rave reviews (watch video). A Halloween show of Dark Tales of the Supernatural for Syracuse University. An Odyssey: Belly of the Beast performance for Old Greenwich School in Connecticut. An adult concert for a Long Island library. All took place on Zoom.
But now Odds is back live with his 12-string guitars, Celtic harp and other instruments. He’s ready to travel once again.
What is he offering?
GOLDEN RULE: World Stories About Empathy for K-2 and 3-6
FAIRY FOLKS AND OLD OAKS: Two Long Fairy Tales told with voices and 12-string guitars
DARK TALES OF THE SUPERNATURAL adult scary concerts for Halloween
DANIKA THE ROSE: A Blend of Dvorak’s Moravian Duets with an original Odds Bodkin fairy tale performed with sopranos Jazimina MacNeil and Sarah Shafer, available for concerts nationwide (the next show is for The Groton School on Jan. 9, 2022!)
THE ODYSSEY: BELLY OF THE BEAST, THE ILIAD: BOOK I, HEARTPOUNDERS: ADULT HALLOWEEN HORROR TALES, BEOWULF: THE ONLY ONE, ODIN AND THOR BATTLE THE FROST GIANTS and FALL OF THE TITANS for universities and high schools
STORYBLAST! Family concerts for libraries, churches and museums are also available.
Be sure to check out the storyteller’s amazing family recordings at Odds’ Shop!
Odds Bodkin’s THE ODYSSEY 4-hour storytelling audio on sale for two weeks! Usually $49.95, now $34.95!
Usually $49.95, you can now grab Odds Bodkin’s classic telling of Homer’s Odyssey for $34.95! Download all 42 episodes today! This sale lasts two weeks, until June 21, 2021!
From the Belly of the Trojan Horse to the Return to Ithaca ten years later, go inside the mind of Odysseus, the original epic hero of Greek mythology. This classic tale is over 4 hours long and great for vacation car travel. Kids love it, and listen intently. Includes a full musical score on 12-string guitar and Celtic harp.
Winner of the Oppenheim Platinum Award for Best Vacation Product.
Tonight at 5 pm EST on Zoom: Meet Persephone, the Unhappy Wife of Hades
In tonight’s performance of HERCULES IN HELL, Hercules tells his own life story shortly after his death. Where does he do this? In the Underworld, a place he is shocked to find himself.
Of course, Persephone, Queen of the Dead, despises her husband Hades. Trapped in the Underworld with him, she longs for news of the living world. And so when Hercules, freshly dead, drops down before her, she won’t let him proceed to his final resting place on Mt. Olympus until Hercules tells both her and her husband his life story.
This is Odds Bodkin’s dramatic setting for the myth of Hercules, a storytelling work originally commissioned by The Art Institute of Chicago for an exhibition of Greek art.
Here’s a sample:
Hercules is reluctant to tell his story, because his life tallies just as many foul murders as glorious acts, but he tells it anyway, just to be able to leave. Does he give the full truth, or just his point of view? In places it’s hard to tell. Nevertheless, in his huge, deep voice, as Bodkin plays 12-string guitar, Hercules begins his story:
“My mother, Alcmene, loved my mortal father Amphitryon, but she would not have him in her bed until he’d avenged the deaths of her brothers, so while he was away, Zeus came to mother, disguised as Amphitryon, and fathered me. So who is my father? Zeus, yes. But I’ve never met him. Some father he is. No, it was Amphitryon who raised me…”
Thusly, the conversation between Hades, Persephone and Hercules unfolds. It’s about a man who cannot control his temper, a bad thing when you’re the strongest man in the world.
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Odds Bodkin won the prestigious Golden Headset Award for Best Audio when he released his epic Hercules recording into the storytelling world. Now you can watch him tell it, live and up close, as he Zooms the show from his studio in New Hampshire.
Tonight! Sunday, Oct. 18th at 5 pm EST. Join the crowd who have bought tickets. If after the show you have a question, Odds will answer it over ZOOM. It’s all live, sponsored by Grendel’s Den in Cambridge, MA. Kari Kuelzer, the owner, will MC the show and moderate questions.
Special thanks to Abigail Taylor, Katie LaBrie and Gavin Bodkin.
HERCULES IN HELL
TONIGHT, Oct 18 at 5 pm EST on ZOOM
Tickets: $15
Tomorrow Night, Masterful Adult Storytelling on ZOOM. The Greek Myth of Hercules
THE PROFESSOR’S OPINION
“Odds Bodkin has been thrilling our (college) students every Fall for years now with his live performances, and this year’s zoom performance of Iliad Book 1 was every bit as successful. We have gotten a good deal of feedback from the attendees, and it indicates that they were mesmerized, as usual. Indeed, several students who had seen Odds perform in the past – and he has fans who come back every year – considered it even better. They loved the fact that they could see his face up close and watch his fingers dance across his guitar and harp.”
–Professor Joseph Walsh, Chair, Department of Classics at Loyola University Maryland after a Zoom appearance last month.
TOMORROW NIGHT, Sunday Oct. 18th at 5 pm Eastern Standard Time
Odds Bodkin goes to work.
Powerful, distinct character voices and 12-string guitar bring his hour-long tale to life.
No Hollywood sugar-coating, just a beautiful, epic Greek myth. Adventure. Tragedy. Humor. Love. Final transcendence.
HERCULES IN HELL
5 pm EST on Zoom
A $15 ticket on Eventbrite buys you a URL and password for the show.
Go BIG SCREEN for best viewing.
Hear a sample of the story:
Sponsored by Grendel’s Den in Cambridge, MA
Telling HERCULES IN HELL to Inmates: A True Story
I’ll be performing HERCULES IN HELL tomorrow, Sunday Oct 18 on ZOOM at 5 pm. Meanwhile, here’s a story about this particular story.
Roy Stevens and I arrived at the prison in the late morning. In the warm Central Valley of California, the compound was little more than a group of low cinder block barracks painted yellow, surrounded by two layers of tall fencing topped by razor wire. At the administration building, the Warden met us as we were buzzed through the multiple gates. He told us that he and his wife would attend the performance along with about a hundred male inmates. The guards wore side-arms.
Frankly, I wasn’t worried about the warden’s opinion nearly as much as I was that if the inmates weren’t entertained by my story, one might shove me a shiv on my way out. I felt like Johnny Cash at Folsum Prison, only I wasn’t famous and singing about a Boy Named Sue. Instead, I was telling an hour-long Greek myth, of all things. Roy had set up this show during a tour. Doing his civic duty was part of his wheeling and dealing to get me out to California for a month of shows.
A group of inmates shuffled through a fenced corridor followed by a guard with a .45 in its holster. All were White and Latino men. While Roy and I were setting up the PA system in the prison yard, it dawned on me that on my little flat stage, there would be nothing between me and the inmates during the show. No raised stage. No barriers.
This wasn’t a super-max, but all these guys were being held here for one unseemly reason or another.
The music will work on them, I remember saying to myself. Just get the music going.
As Roy set up the two big speakers and the PA, I broke out my 12-string guitar, tuning it in the hot sun. Inmates emerged from the barracks, slouching against the walls, staying in the shade. They were curious and skeptical. Politely rephrased, who on earth were we?
Roy Stevens, by the way, is a world-class opera singer, who is now the artistic director of Opera Modesto. We’d met at Sailors’ Snug Harbor on Staten Island a few years before, as across New York Harbor, the newly destroyed World Trade Center was belching smoke.
We’d become friends. We still are.
Just get the music going. The score for HERCULES IN HELL is in a modified e flat tuning, an at times brooding, at other times triumphant set of leitmotifs. So, with the PA on loud, I began warming up. No talk, just music. It boomed across the compound and the men started to listen. I could see from their body language that they liked it. After all, Hercules was a great criminal, a violent and injured man. This music conveys that. And an endless, hard journey. And a lot of sad beauty. Here’s a sample:
Well, in the end, the Warden and his wife showed up and the inmates fell under the bardic spell of Hercules’ deep voice. I told the story non-stop for 65 minutes, and then ended the tale. Nobody moved during the show. After the applause, which I couldn’t believe happened, the inmates lined up to get my autograph, which I couldn’t believe was happening either, and man after grizzled man told me how they’d never heard a story like this before, and that it meant a lot to them. Fifty, sixty of them, I recall. I used fifty or sixty very short #2 pencils. Someone had given each man a scrap of paper as well. For the guys who didn’t have paper, I noticed, other guys tore theirs in half.
Amazed at how grateful and civil the men were, I signed the last autograph, somewhat relieved that nobody had stabbed me with his pencil. After shaking hands with the Warden and his wife, Roy and I left.
HERCULES IN HELL: A story about a tough life with redemption at the end.
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HERCULES IN HELL
An Adult Storytelling by Odds Bodkin
Oct. 18, 2020 at 5pm EST on Zoom
Tickets: $15
If you don’t have Zoom, the download is free!
This Zoom concert is sponsored by Grendel’s Den in Cambridge, MA.
THE HERCULES CHRONICLES: The Birds Who Hurl Feathers Like Arrows
During his Twelve Labors, Hercules constantly wonders why the gods create such hideous monsters, many of which he is commanded to capture or slay. Among them are giant, brass-feathered eagles that infest a forest and regularly carry off village children. Their most deadly defense is to hurl their feathers like razor-sharp arrows.
To drive them off, Hercules travels to Stymphalos with a giant round shield, a spear, his poisoned arrows and a brass bell. When a lone eagle first attacks him in a field, Hercules shoots a poisoned arrow, but it bounces off the eagle’s metal feathers. It angrily hurls three feathers back at Hercules’ shield as he crouches beneath it. The hero instantly knows how he will drive off the flock, which number in the hundreds.
To find out how Hercules does it, set aside an hour on Sunday, Oct. 18 at 5 pm EST for Odds Bodkin’s Zoom performance of HERCULES IN HELL. If you don’t have Zoom, the download is free. There’s a full score on 12-string guitar for added drama, which Odds plays as he tells. With his HD Zoom sound, this guitar thunders with mythic boldness.
Hear a sample:
This is an adult storytelling sponsored by Grendel’s Den. Children 12 and up are welcome.
HERCULES IN HELL on Zoom with Odds Bodkin
Sunday, Oct. 18 at 5 pm EST
TICKETS are $15 per screen.
THE HERCULES CHRONICLES: The Glory of Hera? No, Just the Opposite
“Herakles” translates to “the glory of Hera”, an ironic name indeed for the hero who came to be known as Hercules, since the Queen of Olympus does everything in her power to ruin his life. As Hercules relates it in Odds Bodkin’s live story performance HERCULES IN HELL, when Hera hears that Zeus, her philandering husband, has fathered yet another child with a mortal woman, her jealousy knows no bounds. She conceives an animus for Hercules that will last his entire lifetime.
During her first attempt at his murder, when he’s an infant, she sends two serpents to bite him in his cradle, but instead, just by playing with them, the young demigod strangles them.
None too pleased, but biding her time, Hera waits until Hercules is married with a young family; he’s a prince on his way to becoming king. She then sends what Hercules calls “a storm of blood”, a madness that tears out his senses and plunges him into hallucinations. Attacking him from all sides come monsters, lions, centaurs and enemies, and so in his survival rage he fights back, destroying them all.
It’s only after the madness passes that he finds his wife and children dead at his feet. Their blood is on his hands. He can’t remember doing it. Always too strong, he has now murdered those he loves most. Drowning in guilt and unaware that Hera sent the madness, Hercules fears the insanity will return, and so he flees to the wilderness to live on squirrels and berries, filthy in his solitude.
Still, no matter where he is, the guilt eats at his soul. He cannot sleep. His dead family appears in his dreams every night. Finally, he journeys to the Oracle of Delphi and learns of his unwelcome fate. Zeus and the Fates have decreed that until he completes Labors for the King of Mycenae, Hercules will never be free of his guilt.
And so he journeys to the Court of King Eurystheus of Mycenae, puts himself under the thumb of his weak cousin, and his Labors begin.
Initially, Zeus and the Fates decreed ten labors, but because Eurystheus finds reasons to deny two of them, they end up twelve.
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Join Odds Bodkin via Zoom on Sunday, Oct 18 at 5 pm EST for his epic telling of the life story of Hercules. The camera is up close and the sound and video are HD, so you can watch the instrumental work on 12-string guitar as a master storyteller enacts his characters.
A solid and entertaining lesson in epic Greek mythology, one you’ll never forget. Not recommended for children under 12.
HERCULES IN HELL
Sunday, Oct. 18, 2020 at 5 pm on Zoom
Tickets: $15
THE HERCULES CHRONICLES: The Golden Stag of Artemis/Coming Up Sunday!
Artemis, the virgin goddess of the hunt, owns a supernatural stag. With hoofs of brass and antlers of gold, it’s a glowing creature that hunters are afraid to mistake for game. If they threaten it, Artemis will surely appear and kill them. Legend says the Ceryneian Stag can run at full speed for a year.
When King Eurystheus, Hercules’ petulant cousin, says to bring it to him, Hercules is shocked. “But Eurystheus,” he moans, “it is a sacred beast!”
“Zeus said I could,” his cousin retorts from his throne. “It’s my command! So do it!”
Knowing he’ll have to chase it for a year, Hercules finally spots the stag in the woods. The ancient hero begins to chase it…
To find out how Hercules completes this astonishing labor, with gentleness and honor—including a confrontation with the young goddess herself–grab your $15 ticket for Odds Bodkin’s upcoming Zoom concert, HERCULES IN HELL.
Log in and Odds will appear on full screen for the hour-long storytelling show. Voices for characters and continuous music on 12-string guitar make this an unforgettable experience. You’ll learn more Greek mythology in one hour than you’ve ever known.
HERCULES IN HELL
An Adult Storytelling by Odds Bodkin
Oct. 18, 2020 at 5pm EST on Zoom
Tickets: $15
If you don’t have Zoom, the download is free!
This Zoom concert is sponsored by Grendel’s Den in Cambridge, MA.
THE HERCULES CHRONICLES: The Augean Stables
Eurystheus, King of Mycenae, Hercules’ weak cousin, has been granted control over him by Zeus and the Fates. Hercules must perform labors–anything his cousin asks. Slavery was common in ancient Greece where Greek slaves from conquered towns worked the fields and mines, and cleaned up animal dung. And so when Eurystheus tells Hercules to go clean the filthy stables of King Augeas of Elis, the hero is enraged, but he has no choice.
Upon seeing the years of cow dung piled up to the rafters beneath acres of stables, Hercules’ heart sinks. He must do it in one day. He calculates it will take the shoulders of ten thousand men to do the job. He’s fast, but not that fast. It seems impossible.
And yet he does it.
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Join Master Storyteller Odds Bodkin as he tells this episode and learn how Hercules triumphs in his sixth labor using his wit and strength.
Sunday, Oct. 18th at 5 pm EST on Zoom. The app is free to download if you don’t already have it. With HD sound and video, HERCULES IN HELL is a tour de force of storytelling, scored with powerful, exciting music on 12-string guitar throughout.
An utterly different, magical way to spend a Sunday evening.
TICKETS are $15 per screen.
This is an adult storytelling. Children 12 and up are welcome.
This performance is sponsored by Grendel’s Den of Cambridge, MA. A legendary watering hole. Visit them for great food and atmosphere.
THE HERCULES CHRONICLES: Blood of the Hydra
In Odds Bodkin’s upcoming adult telling of HERCULES IN HELL on Zoom, Hercules makes a fateful error that haunts him for years, and in the end, is the tragic cause of his death.
During his second labor, Blood of the Hydra, the King of Mycenae sends Hercules to slay the Hydra, a dragon with nine heads. It has taken up residence in the swamps of Lake Lerna and has killed everything for miles around it. Birds. Fish. Insects. Everything.
“Wasn’t one of its heads immortal?” asks Persephone, Queen of the Underworld, fascinated by Hercules’ story.
“Yes,” he replies, “but worse than that, its blood was pure poison. One drop, the slightest spatter on your skin, and you die.”
With his young nephew Iolus’ help, Hercules succeeds in slaying the Hydra, but afterwards dips his arrows in the pools of its blood. From then on, just a scratch from one of his arrowheads means instant death.
“And you came to regret that?” asks Hades.
Hercules sighs. “I thought it was wise at the time.”
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Join Odds Bodkin via ZOOM on Sunday, Oct 18 at 5 pm EST for his epic telling of the life story of Hercules. The camera is up close and the sound and video are HD, so you can watch the instrumental work on 12-string guitar as a master storyteller enacts his characters.
A solid and entertaining lesson in epic Greek mythology, one you’ll never forget, this is an adult storytelling not recommended for children under 12.
ZOOM downloads are free.
HERCULES IN HELL
Sunday, Oct. 18, 2020 at 5 pm on Zoom
Tickets: $15
This virtual event is sponsored by Grendel’s Den in Cambridge, MA.