Ephiphany

*gasp* I just realized that posting on this story blog makes me a podcaster!

*blink*blink*

Upcoming shows in December

I'm doing two shows at Chateau Ramezay in Old Montreal on December 13th and December 27th 2008, 3pm on both days. It'll be a 45-minute show entitled Winter Tales or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Cold (just kidding) featuring the following stories:

La Befana (Italian folk tale)
The Month Men (Russian folk tale)
Ti-Fleur and the Magic Fiddler (Quebecois folk tale)
Thomas and La Chasse Galerie (Quebecois folk tale)

This will be a reprise of the show I did at the Yule Fair, but without music this time. I'm also expecting a slightly younger audience this time, which always leads to unexpected twists and turns.

I hope you can make it and bring the little ones. The show is designed to entertain everyone! The address is:

Chateau Ramezay Museum
280, rue Notre-Dame Est
Montréal (Québec)
CANADA, H2Y 1C5
Phone: (514) 861-3708

December 13th and December 27th, 3pm to 4pm
Click here for info about the Museum entrance fee

December Story: La Befana

Here is my story post for December. This story was recorded at the Montreal Yule Fair on December 7th, 2008. It features myself as the teller and Shayne Gryn on guitar. We had about a dozen listeners in a small room next to the Vendors room. La Befana: A Yuletide Tale (7 minutes)

I first read La Befana in a collection of fables called Sun Stories by Carolyn McVickar Edwards. The word Befana means epiphany in Italian, which describes a coming together of seemingly disconnected ideas. La Befana is also a mythological character in Italian culture. Enjoy and I wish you all a happy and safe Yule and a merry Christmas.

Yule Fair 2008: Winter Tales

On Sunday, we had about a dozen listeners for our presentation of Winter Tales at the Yule Fair in Montreal. It's always a pleasure to tell tales to such an appreciative audience and we heard lots of positive feedback about the show. This was the first show that Shayne and I performed together with Shayne on guitar and me talking lots.

It was also the first time I got to try my new microphone and laptop to record the show. I lowered the recording volume slightly so that the distortion wouldn't be such an issue, but I haven't had a chance to listen to it yet. The show was an hour long and it took almost two hours to save it! I think the problem was that I saved it as an MP3 instead of a WAV file, which required the application to compress the audio to MP3 format before it could save it. More things to learn!

I felt pretty good about the performance and I'll be posting the best excerpts from it to the blog (hopefully) this week. If you like the stories, please give me some feedback and pass this blog along to your friends who can appreciate a good story.

Spam free for 39 years!

So Blogger has determined that this is not a Spam-ridden site. Whew.

This coming weekend, I'm performing at the Yule Fair 2008 in Montreal on Sunday at 12:45pm. Shayne will be playing his guitar during the show, so that should be interesting. And I'll be bringing the microphone and laptop to record the whole thing, so you can expect to see (hear) highlights posted on this website in the coming days.

In case you're curious about the Yule Fair:

December 6th and 7th 2008, 10am - 5pm
Melange Magique
1928 Ste. Catherine Street West, 2nd and 3rd floor
Montreal, Qc
There will be vendors, workshops, and lectures in addition to storytelling!

Potted Meat Product

Great. Blogger thinks this blog is some lame-ass excuse to promote spam. It is currently being reviewed by the Blogger Spam Lords, so hopefully they will realize this is a storytelling project and not some random ad that promises that you will lose weight, gain hair, or extend bodily organs.

However, did you know that it turns out I'm Nigerian royalty? When I get my cut, I'll be buying Blogger out. Just you wait.

Testing a Player

I think I may have found a player that allows me to embed the mp3 into the blog. I've tested it out and it works great.

I was getting some bad distortion at first, but then I saved it with a different encoding and the distortion went away.

So in case you're curious, I got the player from 1 Pixel Out, which has all the files you need and easy-to-follow instructions. Enjoy!

Rehearsals and Recordings

Okay, okay... I'm already going to bend the rules of this blog.

Last night, I met with Shayne and we worked on a few stories together. Shayne is playing his guitar while I tell to add an extra dimension to the performance. Ultimately, I'm hoping that Shayne and I will be able to work out a whole show (1.5 hours or so) of stories and music that we can bring to a theatre near you!

Also, I got to try out my new condenser microphone to record the rehearsal. It recorded everything very well, but I need to adjust the recording volume a bit better next time. There's a fair bit of distortion in some parts that I'll need to dial it back a bit to get a better recording.

So here's my first story post to this blog as told by Hobbes and with music provided by Shayne. My thanks go to Dylan from whom I first heard this story.

Lex and the Devil (9 minutes)


Please leave me any feedback you wish! I hope you enjoy this story!

First Posting

This is my first post on this Story Blog. What I'm hoping to do is post one story a month for the next twelve months. Since December is only a week away, I will wait until the first week of December to make my first story post.

I will endeavor to select my stories in sync with the seasons. I may occasionally bend that rule at my discretion.

If you read this blog and listen to the stories, please leave me comments so I can know what you like and don't like.

I guess there are two factors that are really pushing me to do this:
1. I bought a USB condenser microphone which will allow me to record all my shows from now on.
2. I'm hoping this blog will raise my profile as a storyteller, getting me more gigs in the future.

I'm not adverse to occasionally featuring other tellers on this blog. If you're interested in that, send me an email (jdhobbes [at] gmail.com) or leave me a comment.

If you like what you hear here, please tell your friends!