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Stephen Joseph Theatre joins up with Children’s University for online workshops

Hands up for the Children’s University online workshops led by Ernest Acquah

THE Stephen Joseph Theatre is teaming up with the Scarborough & North Yorkshire Children’s University to present exciting and entertaining online versions of their after-school clubs.

Three sets of four workshops, separately covering dance, drama and junk band music, are available from the Children’s University’s Vimeo channel and via the Scarborough theatre and the university’s social media.

Aimed at children aged five to 11, the lively and fun 15-minute workshops will be led by regular tutors Clare Maxwell (dance) and Ernest Acquah (drama and junk band music) and will count towards learning hours in a Children’s University passport.

Cheryl Govan, the SJT’s associate director for children and young people, says: “These are join-in, fun taster sessions: young people can pick when they want to do them and whether to do all of them or just one or two, if they prefer. They’re lively and a great way to try something new at home and maybe encourage children to have a go in ‘real life’ when we can.

“The SJT is a learning destination for the Children’s University and we’ve been running after-school clubs with them for several years now. This is a great way to continue them at the moment and reach even more children.”

Richard Adams, outreach officer for the University of Hull, hosts of the Scarborough Children’s University, says: “Watching and taking part in these videos counts towards learning hours in their passports for those participating in Children’s University through local schools, but also for children from any area in the UK where the Children’s University operates.

“They are also available for any individual child, whether they are part of a participating school or not.

“This programme forms part of a wider outreach Covid response for North Yorkshire coast schools and colleges by the University of Hull, which includes online after-school clubs in a range of subjects, alongside progression support throughout secondary and college year groups.”

Ernest Acquah works at the SJT in stage and production support, creating props, looking after actors and stage-managing shows behind the scenes. He is a sound designer too, also composing music and creating sounds for various productions.

He has run youth theatre groups at the SJT, teaching drama skills and directing plays with young people.

Clare Maxwell is a dance and drama teacher who works with the Stephen Joseph Theatre. She teaches children of all ages all over Scarborough in schools, after-school clubs, in the theatre, for shows and now on video.

The Children’s University charity works in partnership with schools to develop a love of learning in children by encouraging and celebrating participation in extra-curricular activities in and outside of school. For more information, go to: childrensuniversity.co.uk.

The videos can be found at: https://www.childrensuniversity.co.uk/activities/8657

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Could this phone box be hosting Britain’s smallest performance on Halloween?

Phone…home: The red phone box outside Dr Christopher Newell’s house near York

A VILLAGE red phone box near York will house probably Britain’s smallest performance on Halloween night.

Dr Christopher Newell, from the digital media department at the University of Hull, sent an intriguing email to CharlesHutchPress out of the blue on Tuesday morning.

“You may remember me as a very short-lived artistic director of the Grand Opera House. What a fiasco that was!” it started, triggering memories of Chris tempting fate by opening the Cumberland Street theatre after its £4 million renovation with a Balinese version of Macbeth, theatre’s most unlucky play, on September 28 1989.

Sure enough, within two years, the theatre gods had played their accursed Macbeth hand, and the Grand Opera House closed so suddenly, crippled by mounting debts, that staff arrived to find the doors locked.  

Hold the line: Dr Christopher Newell in his phone box

“Anyway, here I am years later, bit of an academic, bit of a cancer patient, bit of a director – with a project to share,” the email continued.

“This Saturday, Halloween night, at 8:00 I will broadcast a 20-minute audio collage of very personal detritus, truth and lies from a telephone box outside my house near York, using a computer-generated version of my voice.

“The audience will probably be one, me.”

Explaining the audio collage content, Chris wrote: “I guess it’s something to do with ghosts, it’s certainly timed to be so. When I was diagnosed with incurable cancer, I thought I had had it.

“I wanted to make a show and as my academic specialism is computer-generated speech and how it relates to acting, I built myself a stage. I bought a phone box and set about equipping it with technology from 1937, the year it was built, and cutting-edge speech synthesis provide by colleagues in Edinburgh.

“An obsession was born that has kept me happy through several bouts of chemo and extended periods of lying in bed. I have been tinkering for five years and on Saturday it goes live. I think this is interesting, do you?” 

“My Guilt”: Dr Newell’s caption for this close-up of his apologetic notice in the phone box

CharlesHutchPress does indeed, and so a list of questions has been fired off to Chris – rather than taking a call in the aforementioned phone box – to discover more.

Where is the telephone box near York?

“Outside my house.” (Chris preferred not to reveal the location but here is a clue: think of a rosy autumn fruit and a deer).

On what medium will you broadcast…and how can people tune in?

“It’s on a web radio channel, GISS Global Internet Streaming Support: a platform for experimentation and research on free technologies in the era of internet media.” 

Go to: http://giss.tv/interface/new.php?mp=gravityisahat.mp3

Can people visit the phone box at other times? 

“Yes, but not while Covid persists.”

Mouth piece: A close-up of Dr Newell’s mouth, on display in his phone box

Is this the smallest arts space you could ever perform in?

“I can’t think of a smaller one but there is bound to be someone who has performed in a barrel or something.”

After Halloween, what happens to the recording?

“I will make it available from my website and then continue to add new performances of new material at Christmas, Easter, Midsummer. I dislike rituals and festivals, so this is my attempt at a subversive counter culture. Yo Ho Ho.”

What does Halloween mean to you?

“Not being dead yet but I thought I was about to be – phew! I am obsessed with Thomas Edison’s paper on The Realms Beyond: he thought he could make a machine to communicate with the dead – I reckon I have.”

On a technical level, how do you computer-generate your voice?  Does it change your voice?

“No. It uses parameters from your real voice to remap them to a computer-generated clone. It’s mega-clever, done by my colleagues at CereProc [a speech synthesis company based in Edinburgh], not by me.

From the outside: Dr Newell’s phone box lit up

“It means the voice can say all the things I can’t – of course, sometimes it can’t say the things I can – this is both a literal and metaphorical statement.”

What are you required to do to maintain the condition of the vintage phone box?

“Not let if freeze – it’s amazingly resistant to extreme weather. It’s got some electronics in it that I have to fix from time to time; paint it every three years; polish the woodwork; chuck out the spiders.”

Is it locked or permanently open?

“Currently I can’t let people in – hence the broadcast – but up until Covid people could pop in any time and did.”

Looking back, did you ever regret your bravura decision to open the Grand Opera House, after 33 years without a play there, with the ever ill-fated Macbeth?

“Not as much as I regretted taking the job at all – I was not the right person. It wasn’t Macbeth that did for it; it was combo of me and the people who owned it.”

For a taster of what lies ahead on Halloween night at Dr Christopher Newell’s phone box, head to: https://k6.gravityisahat.com/wp/live-feeds/

You can read more about the project at https://k6.gravityisahat.com/wp/ and learn more about Dr Newell at http://gravityisahat.com/