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It’s time to get started!

We hope your summer is going well.  We, at the CT Storytelling Center are busy with summer events and laying the important groundwork for our celebrated fall programs.

We look forward to the possibility of your involvement in Tellabration! this year. Tellabration! is one of our favorite times of year and we are anxious to get started lining up the perfect storytellers for sites all over Connecticut  My name is Carol Glynn. I’m a storyteller myself, and I’m helping Ann Shapiro, Executive Director with initial contacts and organization to get the ball rolling. Ann will be kept informed about all discussions and will be taking over in September.  I will be contacting you in a short time to answer any questions or talk about new ideas.   

My email is Tellabrationglynn@gmail.com, and my phone number is 860-334-3470.  I look forward to chatting and planning with you!

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Tellabration! is an international celebration of story. Libraries, historical societies, churches, book stores, museums and community organizations have found Tellabration! to be an exciting and enriching addition to their program offerings. In collaboration with the Connecticut Storytelling Center, each Tellabration! can be customized to appeal to an organization’s specific mission and audience.

Tellabration! is a collaborative effort between The Connecticut Storytelling Center and your organization that can build interest and participation for both of us. The Connecticut Storytelling Center supplies the storytellers who perform at your site. It is important that we schedule your Tellabration! for the audience that is most appropriate for what you normally do, at a time when your patrons are used to coming to your facility.

Our storytellers can accommodate audiences of any age: Littlest Listeners (ages 2 – 4), Children aged 5 – 12, Families, or Adults. We have programs that focus on multicultural folk tales, history, personal life experiences, songs that tell stories, the environment/nature, or stories tailored to your organization’s needs.

A new twist on Tellabration! will be of particular interest to children’s  and young adult or family  audiences.  Our tellers are not just performers. We are also educators and we have a great deal of experience working in schools and community settings where we work with audiences to bring stories to life with audience participation.  We can tell stories and have participants act it out. We can add audience musicians  who play sound effects to support other actors.  We have giant tool bags full of improvisational  theater games and group storytelling activities that can be promoted more as an active role for potential audience members.  Stories are always about listening, but they are often about participating and contributing.  We’d love to brainstorm with you about your expected audience needs and ways to attract audience members.

Another twist on Tellabration! will be of particular interest to Senior Centers and Historical Societies who want to collect oral history from their members by putting out a call for people to come on a given date in November to share stories about their town. The Connecticut Storytelling Center provides a facilitator who will tell a short story based on Connecticut history followed by an open-ended, but structured story sharing time with the audience about the town's history as seen through the people's eyes. The facilitator will prompt the audience’s memory by asking questions about what it was like when they were children, major events that they lived through, and changes they have seen.

The Connecticut Storytelling Center will provide:
    Bios and photos of your storytellers
    Press release for your local publicity
    PDF of a poster for your site’s performance(s)
    Statewide, general publicity
    Audience Building Guidelines
    Email blast to The Connecticut Storytelling Center list
    Listing of Tellabration! sites on The Connecticut Storytelling Center web site
    Listing of The Connecticut Storytelling Center sites in Hearsay, The Connecticut Storytelling Center newsletter

You will:
    Send press release to local newspapers, radio, cable t.v.
    Email blast to your members, clients, patrons
    List your Tellabration! on your web site
    List your Tellabration! in your newsletter
    Display poster locally

Fees:
Our standard financial arrangement is that each site pays a fee of $400 to The Connecticut Storytelling Center for our services and two performers.

For a fee of $250, we will provide one teller.

Another way to produce a Tellabration! is to charge admission. Tickets are typically $10 for adults and $5 for children. Admission fees can be split between The Connecticut Storytelling Center and your organization.

We appreciate your potential interest in hearing more about Tellabration!  We look forward to speaking with you further.

Thanks again,

The Connecticut Storytelling Center