Story-Telling to a Live Audience

Story-Telling to a Live Audience

December 11, 2025

2–3 minutes

Apologies for missing my post last week, but I was so buried in the anxiety and tech of switching computers (to Win11) and related things that I didn’t come up for air in time to realize it was even Wednesday until it had passed. Oh well, might be the first time, but probably not the last. Mea culpa.

I spent last Saturday with my Barbershop Quartet entertaining crowds of children and parents with 4-part Xmas carols up close and personal as they strolled the streets, smithies, craft shops, and various old founders’ buildings of Boalsburg, PA, (Boalsburg’s claim to fame is as the birthplace of Memorial Day). We’ll be doing the same this coming Friday and Saturday on the festive streets of Mifflinburg, PA, all closed to vehicular traffic and turned into a pedestrian CristKindle Marketplace for three days.

It’s usually bitterly bitterly cold to be standing out of doors for a couple of hours, no matter how many layers of outrageous Xmas sweaters and knee socks you wear. So why do we do it? Well, in 2 weeks (yes, on Xmas) I’ll be 72, and I can feel every cold breeze up close and personal while we do it, but the smiles of the children and their parents at seeing live carolers makes up for chilly cheeks (eventually, once I thaw).

What is it about presenting traditional stories (in musical form) that’s so satisfying? You’re introducing the young to some of the important stories of their culture, and in a form that’s easy to digest. Unsurprisingly, their parents appreciate the help with this task, using methods they might not be able to emulate themselves. Civilizing the young is a group effort.

The thing about traditional stories is that everyone knows them, they like hearing parts of them again, and experiencing that in common produces cohesion in the community, as well as offering the discovery of the story for the young, in an approving context.

What about us tale tellers? Now, we’re not writing new modern Xmas carols, by and large, complete with religious belief, but we are presenting tales with morals in them, encouraging some behaviors and calling out others… exemplars, as it were. At least, some of us are. (I know I am.) It’s not because I think that’s my explicit mission, but because that’s the sort of traditional story world I treasure, and I think my readers may, also. I don’t have to be a believer to value the messages of Xmas carols.

So it’s worth bundling up and shivering to do our bit of community enhancement for the young and reminders of our common heritage for the rest of the crowd as part of the culture bearers of our time.

Image: In front of my cabin fireplace dressed for an indoor party as part of a quartet. (You can’t ever get the men’s vests to fit properly, and I’m useless with a needle.)

9 responses to “Story-Telling to a Live Audience”

jaglionpress

December 11, 2025 at 8:49 am

Glad it was only computer problems last week; I was a little worried because of things you’ve said about your health different times. You look nice in the waistcoat.

Reply
1. Karen Myers
  
  December 11, 2025 at 9:44 am
  
  My general health is robust and grand these days (relatively speaking). It’s Alzheimer’s I loath. I can watch it operating in complete detail internally, I can analyze the processes and effects explicitly. And none of this knowledge actually improves the situation (though it does improve my store of sarcasm and black humor.)
  
  I’m used to knowledge-being-power. “Irritating” doesn’t begin to describe my mental processes now.
  
  Sigh…
  
  Reply
  1. jaglionpress
    
    December 11, 2025 at 10:02 am
    
    Virtual hugs of sympathy sent, fwiw.
    
    Reply
TXRed

December 11, 2025 at 9:40 am

“Old tales told again,” may be part of the reason a lot of melodic rock groups do ballads, or revive old ballads. One of my favorites, Xandria, has one that includes elements of “Sul-a-run” and other tales of lovers gone to the wars or to sea, including the seven-seas, seven-mountains, seven-rivers pattern.

I’ve done modern Christmas music, sometimes with ancient texts, and Ye Olde Favorites. If you want to sell out a hall? Announce that the orchestra and two choirs will be doing the Christmas portion of Messiah, with a few other well-known Advent compositions. It might be the fastest we have ever sold out a non-headliner concert. Which says that the market and desire are alive and well. As you said, Karen, old tales told again, in musical form, are well loved by many.

PS. I am completely with you on Windows and other operating system updates. “What will go wrong and what features will I lose” are my first two questions. Always.

Reply
1. jaglionpress
  
  December 11, 2025 at 10:06 am
  
  I was never happier eith anything OS related than when Microsoft Updates told me, “your computer is too old and crappy to run Win11, please buy a new one”, because it meant they couldn’t force-update from 10 to 11 the way they did from whatever to 10 on the same computer.
  
  Reply
  1. TXRed
    
    December 11, 2025 at 11:21 am
    
    My writing laptop won’t take the last two Apfel OS changes. That fills me with delight. The new phone iOS … is useless for what I need or want, and has added multiple unneeded steps to my usual activities.
    
    Reply
    1. jaglionpress
      
      December 11, 2025 at 12:35 pm
      
      Yikes!
      
      Reply
Draven

December 11, 2025 at 6:08 pm

As an Uber driver, i literally tell stories to live audiences four days a week…. of course, said audiences are max four people, but anyway

Reply
Dan Lane

December 12, 2025 at 12:20 am

I’ve been many things at different times in life. A live musician. A steamfitter. A roofer. A carpenter. A truck driver. A small time mechanic. A tech support troubleshooter. A network guy (the logistical, line pulling, pole climbing, attic and basement crawling type). A factory line worker. A newspaper guy. A scary guy frightening teenagers in a haunted house.

But through it all, a storyteller. It’s in the blood. My parents, grandparents, and great grandparents were tellers of tales, too. Some of them even might have been true.

There’s a pattern and rhythm to spoken tales. It’s very much and audience participation thing, small scale. You see the reactions on peoples faces as your words hit their ears. Sometimes good, sometimes bad. Most of the old oral stories are moralistic. They stuck around much for that reason, tales told to children to entertain as they teach. It worked then, and does now.

There’s a part of the culture that still does this. And, like as not, always will- so long as we have children and willing ears to listen. Story is part of the human psyche. Without it, we wouldn’t be recognizable as human anymore. *Ritual* is a highly stylized form of storytelling (but not *just* that), as well.

The cultural impact of such things as carols, stories, parades, festivals, and the like is vastly underestimated by nearly everybody on the planet. Only weirdos and trained anthropologists get all interested in such things- and children, too.

Reaffirming and strengthening culture is what’s going on there. That is something that traditional American culture NEEDS. And yet, putting such importance on it seems humorous, silly, and fundamentally unserious. To most, that is.

Reply