For some years now, Tom has been hosting a storytelling workshop for all-comers at festivals and fairs, covering as much of the things that he’s learned down the years as he can fit in, aimed at enabling and emboldening new storytellers as well as helping those already telling tales to hone their skills. It's always been well-received and we feel that the workshop has something valuable to offer.

And so, given that we shan't be sitting around any fires this summer save for our own hearth-fires, we're offering this workshop in an online form. Numbers for each workshop will be limited to 10, and it should last about three hours. We'll be running the workshop monthly for the rest of this year!

Note - this is the same workshop, run every month. If you’re looking to dive even deeper, have a look at the Hedgespeaker six-month course below.

Thanks to our Arts Council funding, we are offering three fully-funded places for this workshop on each of the dates. Priority for those places will be for people from travelling cultures, refugees and migrants, but anyone who would like a place and can't afford it is welcome - email us if you'd like to apply, with a brief message about why you'd like a free place. For everyone else, the cost of the workshop is £75.

See all the dates for the workshop by clicking the big red button...

For those who’d like a deeper immersion, we’re running our first ever longer course, too. In Hedgespeaker, Tom will be exploring as much as he can of the arts and craft of good storytelling, which will involve three long sessions over six months.

Again, there are free places available on this course, also prioritising people from travelling cultures, refugees and migrants, so get in touch if that sounds like you. The cost of the course for others is £250 and we think it’ll be quite unlike anything else you’ve experienced and worth every penny.

For full details of this course, click below. There are a very limited number of places - nine in total - so do book soon if you’d like a place. Expect to be ushered beyond your comfort zone with kindness and - while there is no shortcut to becoming a good storyteller - we believe you’ll emerge from the course with a clearer sense of what you’re up to, a bolder tongue for telling and a few ways of working with stories that might just unlock some of their magic in your relating.

The course will begin at 6.00pm on Sunday 16th August.

We’re still finalising the details of part two of our 2020 offerings, but they include Hedgespoken Picture House which we’re very excited about - a series of filmed tellings of some of our favourite tales (particularly ones from Traveller and Romany cultures) - and Radio Hedgespoken, a regular and much-dreamed podcast featuring tales, talk and music.

For Radio Hedgespoken, we’re looking for established and new storytellers of all sorts to tell a tale and perhaps have some conversation with, particularly those from travelling cultures, and refugee and migrant tellers. There is a bit of money in the pot for this, so do get in touch if that sounds like you, or if you have any suggestions. Do please spread the word in all the ways you can, and pass this email on to anyone who you think might be interested. (There’s a button at the bottom for doing just that.)

Apart from the Arts Council funding, we somewhat predictably fell through the subtantial cracks in all the government Coronavirus financial support, so I’d like to just point a well-scrubbed finger towards our quietly-present patronage scheme, KEEP HEDGESPOKEN ROLLING, where you can offer one-off or monthly donations to keep us rolling on. Thank you to all those who have helped us already! Click on the image below to find out more.

You can also support us by buying books, artworks and audiobooks from Hedgespoken Press or joining our Friends of Hedgespoken Press scheme - thank you if you already have!

Rima has a Patreon page for her work here and I have a Ko-Fi page here where you can toss a few coins into the hat, too. Every single penny, however it comes, is so gratefully received!