Susan Charters
1192 Birchcliffe Cres.,
R.R. 4, Orillia, ON L3V 6H4
Home/Résidence: 705-325-8463
FAX/Télecopier: 705-325-5596
Email/Courriel: Susan Charters
Susan Charters is a storyteller, writer, teacher and musician from Orillia, Ontario. Her committment to the power of oral storytelling shows in her storytelling style, which is welcoming and compelling, building on a strong connection with the audience to carry the tales she shares.
Convinced that stories heal and bring people together, and that stories gain meaning when they are told, she performs willingly in her local community at a variety of gatherings. Her repertoire includes modern and traditional tales, Biblical stories, and wolf tales. She has performed in group and school settings in central Ontario, in Toronto, and at the Ottawa Storytelling Festival, the Orillia Arts for Peace Festival, and the Mariposa Folk Festival, where she has also helped to organize a storytelling corner in the festival's Folk Play area. At one-time a teacher in the Parent-Child Mother Goose Program®, Susan leads storytelling workshops for adults and children, and facilitates a storytelling group at the public school where she teaches.
Blending music and story is a special joy for Susan, whose performances often incorporate music, either through song or with the accompaniment of another storyteller/musician. One of her favourite collaborations has been an evening of stories from "A Thousand Nights and a Night", which included a belly dancer to set the scenes.
Her current project is an historical one, Blood and Fire: The Donnelly Project, a programme that combines stories by Susan and songs by Orillia singer/songwriter paul court, that together examine the century-old debates surrounding the brutal murders of five members of the notorious Donnelly family of Lucan, Ontario, in 1880.
The massacre of the Donnellys, and the lack of any final judgement on the perpetrators, was sensational at the time it happened, and has never ceased to be controversial. The truth was so well hidden at the time that the story cannot help but emerge from history told in bits and pieces offering differing opinions of the justice or the brutality of the killings. There is a wide range of material, from newspapers of the day to 20th-century collections of oral history from the town, that support almost every interpretation of the facts.
Blood and Fire reflects this kaliedescope of viewpoints. Like the songs, composed from different points of view, the stories are told by different characters involved in or watching the events play out. There are also stories from an Irish perspective to remind us all that what happened here had roots abroad. Based on research, the songs and stories are meant to have a flavour of oral history, and reveal many facts known about the conflict.
The next performance of Blood and Fire will be at the Mariposa Folk Festival, July 8,9, and 10, 2011, in Orillia, Ontario, where Susan will also be storytelling on the interactive stage. First performed in a house-concert setting in 2008, The Donnelly Project was performed in April 2009 as part of the St. Mary's Storytelling winter programme, in November 2009 in Toronto for the Legless Stocking series, and in October 2010 in the historical storytelling series of the Waterloo Region Museum.
A CD of the first concert is available (contact Susan), made with the support of musicians and friends, and is a fine blend of song and story about the incidents surrounding the massacre. Like the full performance, it does not draw conclusions. Both the show and CD are intended to draw you into the story, let you hear the voices that are willing to speak, revealing or hiding what they wish, and letting you form you own opinion, as so many have, about the brutal events of February 1890 in that small Ontario Township.
Feb. 17, 2011
