THE HARVEST: STORIES OF THANKSGIVING Coming Up. Free Admission!

Featuring a new collection of tales and free to the public, these shows are coming up November 2nd at 6 pm at Ossippee Public Library in Ossippee, NH and on November 4th at 1 pm at Scarborough Middle School in Scarborough, ME, sponsored by Scarborough Library.

These three stories from around the world are filled with music on Celtic harp, 12-string guitar and African thumb piano. Each explores traditional harvests and how people felt about them and features character voices, vocal effects and audience participation.

Great for kids, adults and families, the show includes a Swedish tale, a Togo story and a hilarious Italian fairytale. Come catch some Odds Bodkin magic to welcome in the Thanksgiving Season!

To learn more, visit https://www.oddsbodkin.net/calendar/

Plus, in Suffield, CT, you can catch the last SPOOKY TALES FOR YOUNG FAMILIES show of the season at Kent Memorial Library in Suffield at 1 pm!

SPOOKY TALES SHOWS at NH Libraries This Week! Free to the Public.

What other storytelling show is spooky but let’s you howl like a steam train’s whistle? Or thunder your hands in rhythm as supernatural horses chase a little boy? For Halloween, it’s FUN SPOOKY TALES FOR YOUNG FAMILIES coming up this Thursday and Friday in New Hampshire.

Thursday, Oct. 26 at 6 p.m. you can hear them at Bethlehem Public Library in Bethlehem, NH.

Friday October 27 at 3 p.m. you can hear them at Dunbarton Public Library in Dunbarton, NH.

Music on 6 and 12-string guitars and Celtic harp. A ghostly train tale from Colorado, a scary story from French Canada, and a wild adventure fairytale with witches from Italy make this kid-tested show tons of fun. Appropriate for young children.

Both shows are free to the public!

FUN SPOOKY TALES at WARNER TOWN HALL in NH October 28th

If “Imagination is more important than knowledge” as Einstein said, then pulling children from screens and urging them to use this natural human gift is a key parenting tool these days. Spoken word storytelling, especially with live music, hyper-stimulates kids’ minds, urging them to imagine. This builds neural networks that mature into creativity as they grow up.

With all that said, these are fun stories, too. Spooky, but child-manageable. The Banshee Train, The Girl Who Danced with the Devil and The Little Shepherd are the stories in this one-hour show. Music on 6-string guitar, 12-string and Celtic harp add to the enchantment.

This coming Saturday, October 28th at 3 p.m. I’ll be performing Fun Spooky Tales for Young Families. The show is sponsored by Schoodacs of Warner. Grab a great coffee or tea there and then step next door to the Town Hall!

Tickets are $10. Hope to see you there!

TWO SHOWS IN NH THIS WEEKEND/No Cellphones Required

“Smartphone dystopia” is a term recently coined by Google engineers who now send their young kids to elite Silicon Valley schools that ban smartphones and iPads. Read about that here.

To completely escape smartphone dystopia, at least for an hour, tonight I’ll be performing a story show, THE HARVEST: Tales of the Land at 6 pm in Gilford, NH for the Belknap County Farm Bureau. My audience: farmers. Three disarming and insightful adult stories, with echoes of the Monsanto vs organics war. It’s a private function.

However, Sunday night’s show at 7 pm is public. HEARTPOUNDERS: Halloween Tales of Horror unfolds at the Riverwalk Music Bar in Nashua, NH. Composed of the grittiest, most unsettling supernatural tales I know, the show includes mythic material from New England, Russia, China and other far flung places. It also explores Samhain, the old Celtic celebration, and how it was turned into All Hallow’s Eve by the Church during the conversion centuries following St. Patrick’s and others’ arrivals among the Druid pagan sacrificers of Northern Europe.

Tickets are $10 in advance, $13 at the door.

You’ll have a chance to enjoy your natural imagination at work, without a single “Like” button.

Have a great weekend!

FAMILY STORIES EXTRAVAGANZA at The Livery in Sunapee NH this Friday!

Odds Bodkin’s best family-friendly stories come to The Livery in Sunapee, NH this Friday, August 11th at 7 p.m. With Celtic harp, 12-string guitars and other instruments, Odds uses character voices and natural sound effects to create “imagination movies” for listeners.

Come join the fun!

Tickets are $10 adult, $5 children, $25 for a family of 4. Get them here!

If You Know Any Librarians in New England…

In my storytelling shows for kids, I always end with a “showstopper” story. That’s one with a song I teach them to sing. Simple phrases. Melodies that stick in kids’ minds so well that for days afterwards, teachers tell me, students sing them in the halls. Rhythms, too, and I mean clap-along or even stomp-on-the-floor beats. This is some of my best material for K-5th graders.

 

So if you know any librarians in New England, pass along the word to them that for this summer I’m offering a special show of nothing but showstopper stories. Three of them in a row, something I’ve never offered before. It’s called AN EXTRAVAGANZA OF FAMILY TALES WITH FUNNY SONGS IN EVERY ONE.

 

Since it’s for libraries, I’m making it extra affordable. Anyone can inquire about it at my web site here.

 

ADULT STORYTELLING IN CAMBRIDGE, MA: HERCULES IN HELL

“Oh, Hercules, I find your story so exciting!” effuses Persephone, Hades’ unhappy wife. Hercules has landed in the Underworld, a place he didn’t expect to be.

 
“Do you?” he asks, disgusted at the situation. He’s been telling his life story in order to get out of here and go to Olympus. Persephone, Hades’ unwilling wife, longs for news of the living, which until a moment ago Hercules was. But now he’s dead.

 
Hades doesn’t like his wife’s tone. “Oh, hold your heart back, Persephone,” he says jealously, wondering if this confession business was a good idea. He tries to make Persephone happy, but considering that he’s raped, abducted and imprisoned her here in the Land of the Dead, it’s a hard sell. She hates him. “He won’t be here long.”

 
Hercules has lived a hard, terrifying life. The last thing he wants to do is remember it for these two. “Let me go now and I’ll stop right here,” he growls sarcastically.

 
“Calm yourself,” Hades demands.

 
“Calm myself,” he retorts, getting angry. “Do you think it makes me calm to sit here and tell all this to you two dreary souls?” His voice has risen.

 
“Hades, he is rude!” she complains.

 
“Uh, yes,” Hades responds, “Hercules, shades like you typically do not speak here. If you’d like me to remove your voice…”

 
“No, no, no, I’ll calm myself,” the dead hero replies. “Oh, yes. I learned to do it. Took a long time…”


This is the fictional setting I use to tell the myth of Hercules. Only the characters speak. There is no narration from me. Just Hercules, Hades, Persephone and a host of other voices from Hercules’ sad, shattered life. That and a full, ongoing score on 12-string guitar with an introduction on Celtic harp. The tale is a long one, but it’s filled with humor, tragedy, adventure and in the end, hope. And I hope you’ll join me this coming Sunday evening, April 23rd at 8 p.m. in Cambridge, MA to hear it and imagine along with me. The venue is Grendel’s Den. Enjoy a mythic Greek meal, good drinks and some adult storytelling!
Tickets are here.