Two vibrant festivals continue to set the standard for children's entertainment, but a third has been axed, writes Lorna Siggins
More than 60 years ago, the City of Benares set sail from Liverpool in a convoy of 19 ships. Among the 406 people on board were 101 adults and 90 children who were being evacuated to Canada by the Children's Overseas Reception Board.
When the ship left harbour on Friday, September 13th, 1940, 300 German bombers had already flown up the Thames to discharge their deadly cargo over London city, and Luftwaffe pilots returning to their bases in northern France had described "an ocean of flames".
The traumatised charges of the City of Benares were being sent across the Atlantic for their own safety. The vessel was just four days at sea when it was torpedoed by U-48, skippered by one of Germany's most successful submarine commanders, Lieut-Cmdr Heinrich Bleichrodt. In force five winds, lowering lifeboats from the sinking ship proved to be very difficult. Many of those who did not drown immediately were to die of hypothermia before the British destroyer, HMS Hurricane reached them the following afternoon.
Some 245 crew and passengers lost their lives, including all but 13 of the 90 children. Among the small group of young survivors were two girls, Bess Walder and Beth Cummings, who spent 19 hours on an upturned lifeboat. During that terrifying time together, the determined pair willed each other to survive.
Lali Morris, director of the Galway-based Baboró International Arts Festival for Children, was riveted by the story, as interpreted by author Nicola McCartney, when she saw it performed on stage at last year's Edinburgh Children's Festival.
"When the two women were approached many years later to write a play about their ordeal, they gave an interesting response," Morris says. "They felt that the author \ was 'much nicer than that fellow Steven Spielberg . . .' " Morris chuckles as she relates the anecdote, delighted that the finished work, performed by Scottish company, Catherine Wheels Theatre Company, is being staged in Galway.
Winner of the 2002 Barclays' Theatre Award for the best show for children and young people, Lifeboat is dynamic and ingenious, Morris says. She has already spoken enthusiastically of it during her visits to schools as part of the preparation for the week-long festival.
The Baboró director can approach her young audiences with some authority, because she has already watched all of the performances on the programme. This has been her approach to the festival since she took over as director three years ago. Prior to that she had been a guest director when Baboró was part of the Galway Arts Festival.
Morris is well qualified for her enviable job, which takes her to children's festivals in Denmark and Canada, as well as to Imaginate in Edinburgh and beyond. One of her first jobs on leaving college in the US was to work for a children's season in an educational establishment. She became an educator, drama specialist, drama teacher and director. "Now I feel I have turned full circle, with Baboró," she says.
Juggler and comedian Izzi Tooinsky of the Little Giant Theatre has also come a long circuitous route to this year's Baboró. "I first saw him \ many years ago at a rural school in Iowa, and I felt that this was a man with a big heart who connects with children," says Morris. "He isn't a 'big show' performer, and much of his work has been with community and voluntary organisations. When I finally found him again, he was in Australia." Tooinsky not only agreed to come to Galway - he will be on tour throughout the west. He appears at Sonas, the highly successful children's festival in Louisburgh, Co Mayo tonight and has been booked for Glór in Ennis, Co Clare, and the Ashling children's festival in Longford.
Puppetry is one of the central themes in Galway this week, with a puppet showcase including two of Ireland's best-known artists, Brian Bourke and Jay Murphy, Puikebuiken from the Netherlands, Tommy Baker of Your Man's Puppets in Gort, Co Galway, and Pignut Productions. Morris is also excited to have musician and puppeteer, Peter Rinderknecht, from Switzerland's Theatre En Gros et En Detail, who uses a double bass as set and prop for a story of love and conflict between father and son, entitled Portofino-Ballade.
Although there is no great tradition of children's art festivals here, linking with other festivals makes Baboró financially viable, Morris points out. Geraldine Mitchell, one of the organisers of Sonas, which also runs this week, agrees. "By running, and sharing acts, at the same time of year, we can keep the travel costs down," Mitchell says. "And what's even better is that we tend to share the same approach."
Like Baboró, Sonas is based on the philosophy that art is not just about entertainment, not just for adults, and that it contributes to personal and social development. Globalisation and the impact it is having on the developing world is a theme of the Sonas programme, which has a heavy emphasis on workshops - some of which have been running in local Co Mayo schools.
For several weeks, artist, Tom Meskell and drama facilitator, Joanna Parkes, have been working with pupils from Louisburgh, Killeen and Lecanvey national schools in Co Mayo on a project entitled "Out of this World", in which the participants have to imagine what it must be like to leave home and live on another planet. The result is being displayed in the Granuaile Centre, Louisburgh, Co Mayo throughout the festival week.
Among the many acts at Sonas are The Armagh Rhymers, returning for the third year in a row, a Czech classical music duo, Marianna Alaberdova and Tony Brychta, and singer, storyteller and juggler Toby Kinsella. Both Sonas and Baboró will present storyteller Niall de Burca, Tommy Baker and Izzy Tooinsky.
The two festivals are also hosting the South African production, A Boy Called Rubbish by Ellis Pearson and Bheki Mkhwane - fresh from the Dublin Theatre Festival. Performed in both English and Zulu, it tells the story of a boy called Rubbish who is transformed from "snivelling slave" to the hero of his community.
Baboró's outreach programme, supported by the Irish Youth Foundation, also involves Tom Meskell, and visual artists Sharon Lynch and Allison Young. Children's author Dairíne Ní Dhonnchú (best known as Dr Sinéad Ní Bhaoil in TG4's Ros na Rún) is holding drama workshops as Gaeilge in counties Galway and Mayo. Baboró has booked a series of workshops with Scottish Youth Dance, art talks for children organised by the National Gallery, and an introduction to classical music for young audiences from the Contempo String Quartet.
For both festivals, involvement with schools is imperative."Gaining teachers' trust is so important, and we have had wonderful feedback," Mitchell says of Sonas. "The teachers have noticed improved levels of dexterity among the kids, and we have watched them become better audiences every year, during the five years of our existence."
About 40 transition-year students are participating in the Louisburgh festival this year, the local library is involved, and Sonas has a strong community dimension. "In a sense, the community has taken ownership of it now, and that is very significant," Mitchell notes.
Baboró has also developed to the extent that it may produce its own show next year, according to Morris. She is also trying to encourage Irish companies to make early contact with her, with a view to participation. "Part of our mission is to encourage indigenous work." And her ambition is to take some Irish artists to the festival she attends in Denmark every year. "I know that it will be so inspiring for them," she says.
However, while Baboró and Sonas are thriving, the west's third children's festival, RoolaBoola, which takes place in Castlebar, Co Mayo, has had to be cancelled this year. Last January, Marie Farrell, director of the Linenhall Arts Centre in Castlebar, confirmed that the Arts Council's 18 per cent cut infunding to the centre had taken its toll on RoolaBoola, which is normally held the week after Sonas and Baboró.
The decision was taken with immense sadness, she said, given that 2003 would have marked the festival's seventh year. For a sector of the community often sidelined in terms of arts and culture, the festival had become immensely successful as a "cultural focal point" for the children of Co Mayo, Farrell says. In 2002, more than 1,000 young people from all over the county and beyond participated in "sell out" workshops and shows, and some 7,000 people came for the final weekend.
Unlike Baboró, which has a separate board and funding structure, RoolaBoola was financed from the Linenhall's general revenue grant. "I would hope that RoolaBoola can be revived next year," Farrell says. "That will be contingent on the grant that we receive."
• Baboró in Galway and Sonas in Louisburgh, Co Mayo, open today and continue until next Sunday, October 19th. There is a jamboree in Galway next Saturday, and a family fun day in Louisburgh's Sancta Maria College the following day.
For information and bookings, contact Baboró Box Office, Town Hall Theatre at 091-563636 from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Monday to Saturday, and Sonas at Louisburgh Community Project at 098-66218.
