Libraries Host 'Stories, Music and Crazy Kazoos' Monday and Tuesday [June 15 and 16]
June 12, 2009 —
Channel your inner imagination, says nationally known and acclaimed storyteller Beth Horner.
Her family-friendly performances, entitled “Stories, Music and Crazy Kazoos,” Monday and Tuesday [June 15-16] are a treat for the community, says Nancee Dahms-Stinson, the Springfield-Greene County Library District’s youth services coordinator.
“We don’t have many professional storytellers who appear in the area, aside from Missouri State University’s annual conference. This is a chance to see someone who seldom gets to the Ozarks area, but is a regular performer at the National Storytelling Festival in Tennessee.”
Horner, who has performed for adults, teens and children for more than 18 years, is as entertaining as she is empowering.
“When you watch a story on television or in a movie theater, you see one person’s depiction of an image—of a monster, a prince or an enraged tiger eating a buffalo chip. When you hear a story, you create that image yourself. When I’m telling stories to 50 different people, there are 50 different movies going on in the minds of listeners. Nothing is as powerful or vivid as your own imagination,” Horner said.
Horner’s performances, the second in a series of free events during the Library District’s summer reading clubs and programs, are partially funded by the Missouri Arts Council. Here’s the schedule: Monday [June 15], 10 a.m., Midtown Carnegie Branch Library; Monday [June 15] 2 p.m., Republic Branch Library; Tuesday [June 16], 10 a.m., Ash Grove Elementary School; Tuesday [June 16], 1 and 2 p.m., Library Station.
A resident of the Chicago area, Horner’s roots are in central Missouri. She was born on a farm in Boone County and was raised in Columbia. Her storytelling, “which takes her listeners on journeys of adventure, warmth, wonder, haunting eeriness and raucous laughter,” uses a wide range of folk, literary, traditional, contemporary and original tales from around the world.
She’s also a “funny and delightful person,” says Dahms-Stinson, and a performer you shouldn’t miss.
Jeanne C. Duffey, community relations director for the Springfield-Greene County Library District, can be reached at jeanned@thelibrary.org.