The Heartland Storytelling Guild will be presenting an array of talent at the 17th annual Minnesota Storytelling Festival to be held in Austin March 1-3.

Saturday, February 23, 2002

The Heartland Storytelling Guild will be presenting an array of talent at the 17th annual Minnesota Storytelling Festival to be held in Austin March 1-3. Nationally known storytellers will be sharing folk tales, personal experiences, music, and fun for audiences at a variety of venues. The programs will include a dinner theatre, storytelling concerts, a workshop, an open stage, and church services. Different stories will be shared at each performance.

The storytellers featured throughout the weekend are Michael Cotter, third generation farmer from Austin; Angela Lloyd, a virtuoso on the washboard from Victorville, Calif.; Connie Regan-Blake who tells Appalachian Mountain tales from Asheville, N.C.; and Tim Tingle, a member of the Choctaw Nation from Canyon Lake, Texas. On Friday night, Albert Lea storyteller Bev Jackson will perform, and throughout the weekend, Jack Koppa of Austin will provide a welcome to theatre-goers with his concertina.

Jackson, the executive director of the Freeborn County Historical Museum, said she’s found that storytelling has had a big influence on the programs she does at the museum and the columns she writes for the newspaper.

&uot;People like being looked at on a more personal basis,&uot; Jackson said.

She said everyone brings in something different about themselves, and others really listen. When people listen to us, we feel better about ourselves.

&uot;And storytelling is an incredible tool. It really nurtures the creativity in the mind,&uot; Jackson said.

Cotter, the festival’s founder, has shared his stories with audiences nationwide. He was recently the keynote speaker at the International Rural Partners Conference in Duluth, co-authored with Bev Jackson the book, &uot;Growing Up On A Minnesota Farm,&uot; and emceed the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, Tenn. He hosts a weekly radio show, &uot;Remember When,&uot; on Austin KAUS Radio.

&uot;I never really traveled in my young life,&uot; Cotter said of attending these festivals. &uot;And I’m not a good traveler. But I do like people, and now there’s a whole bunch of them I know because of storytelling.&uot;

Storytelling changed his life. &uot;It’s something that fit me that I didn’t know,&uot; Cotter said, adding that when many men retire, they don’t know what they’ll do with themselves.

&uot;I have a life and I’m still going toward it with passion and purpose. I talk to people I never planned to in my life.&uot;

Lloyd has a master of fine arts degree in acting, and since 1980 has toured throughout the United States.

She has worked with thousands of school children, and her audio recording, &uot;Dreams and Other Realities,&uot; was given a gold award by the national association of Parenting Publication Awards.

Regan-Blake is a founding member of the National Storytelling Association, and is widely recognized as a pioneer in bringing public recognition to storytelling as an art form. She worked in collaboration with The Kandinsky Trio and Grammy Award-winning Mike Reed in a concert series blending chamber music and storytelling.

Tingle’s stories are a unique blend of Native American tradition and history. In his music, he uses the flute, drum, vocal chants and folk instruments. He has performed across America at schools and festivals has toured Germany four times under the sponsorship of the U.S. Department of Defense.

Koppa has been playing the concertina since he was 5 years old. He was born and raised in Mosinee, Wis., a German and Polish area, a world of polkas and waltzes. He’s tried to play various other instruments, but the only instrument he was ever interested in was the concertina. His life is the unique blending of funeral director and performer.

The Friday dinner theatre will be held at the Holiday Inn in Austin, Saturday’s events at the Paramount Theatre, and the Sunday church services at Our Savior’s Lutheran Church. Tickets can be purchased at Nemitz’s/Black Bart’s and The Little Professor Book Store in Austin or by calling The Minnesota Storytelling Festival at 373-4748. For more information, write The Minnesota Storytelling Festival, 1206 W. Richway Drive, Albert Lea.