Oral tradition stories

November 29, 2006 11:50 AM

Hello dudes. Do you know where I can find recordings of good oral tradition storytellers on/offline? (in English)
posted by London Irregular to Media & Arts (9 answers total)

Yellow Moon Press has a good selection of storytelling recordings.
posted by cadge at 12:17 PM on November 29, 2006

Hit up a nearby storytelling festival. You can hear dozens of storytellers, find recordings, and get recommendations plus they're tons of fun!
posted by Science! at 12:55 PM on November 29, 2006

You might try searching www.archive.org in the audio section. I know they have a good deal of spoken word, but I never searched specifically for stories.
posted by Area Control at 1:04 PM on November 29, 2006

I can recommend a storyteller: Michael Parent is a very funny and entertaining storyteller for adults and children. I believe he was raised in Canada; many of his stories originate from that area and he has a bilingual (English-French) storytelling audio cassette. Even if you're not into his work, he would definitely be able to give you advice on storytelling--he wrote the book on it.
posted by Deathalicious at 1:28 PM on November 29, 2006

I think you'll probably do best by finding the names of great storytellers and searching them out. I know that Pete Seeger did a bit of storytelling along with his music.

Also, there have got to be a bunch of storytelling organizations, with websites, out there. I know for a fact that many of these organizations have "tell-offs" where storytellers compete to tell the best yarn. Maybe one of them has mp3s available.

Refugee Stories offers oral tradition stories in mp3, although these are not "professional" storytellers.

I know recommending google is generally frowned up on as an AskMe answer, but here google is really helpful. A search for oral tradition storytellers mp3 led to this which led to this, which is broken, but go to the main page and you have the website of Will Claflin, "a master storyteller" according to the American Library Association.

If you live near London as your username suggests, I'd check out the London Centre for International Storytelling. If offline recordings are fine, I can't see how they aren't the first place you should go.
posted by Deathalicious at 1:40 PM on November 29, 2006

The Library of Congress' American Memory series includes a large number of these things. Some of them are fascinating!
posted by nasreddin at 1:41 PM on November 29, 2006

You might be interested in StoryCorps, which NPR has been airing for the past few years.
posted by HotPatatta at 2:46 PM on November 29, 2006

Garrison Keillor's monologues from the show "Prairie Home Companion"? Some of them are available on CD.
posted by AmbroseChapel at 3:19 PM on November 29, 2006

In Montreal, on the last Sunday of every month at Hurley's Pub there's a storytelling session by Mike Burns. He's a fantastic storyteller who tells mostly in English, but occasionally in Gaelic or French. He also travels around the world for storytelling festivals and stuff.

So if you're ever in the area, definitely check that out.
posted by DrSkrud at 7:55 AM on November 30, 2006