2019 Shoals Front Porch Pop-up & Storytelling Festival

Shoals Front Porch Storytelling Festival 2019 

March 5, 2019, 11:30-1PM, 2019  Dolores Hydock Through the Back Door ~ The Music that Bridged the Bayou. Mardi Gras luncheon, Sheffield Public Library, Sheffield, AL

May 6, 2019, 2-3PM, 2019  Dolores Hydock Helen Keller Library 511 N Main St. Tuscumbia, Al 

Literary Treason the Writings of Bess Streeter Aldrich 

This program looks at the life and work of Bess Streeter Aldridge a Nebraska Writer of the 1930s who accomplished what a few others did:

While she raised her family as a single mother, she had a successful, self-supporting career as a female writer during the first half of the 20th century.

The program describes her early life and later career success and includes a telling of “Jundo Swans,” Aldrich’s funny touching short story that’s a reminder that there

S no disaster like an elementary school play and no friend as important as your best friend when you’re ten years old.

May 16, 2019, 10-11AM Dishing the dirt Cypress Lake Golf & Tennis Club 1311 E Sixth St. Muscle Shoals, Al Sponsored by Muscle Shoals Public Library Tickets are $5 including a light brunch before the program call 256-386-9212 

Whether you’ve got the greenest thumb since Johnny Appleseed or you managed to kill a rock garden, you’ll enjoy these stories about Mother Nature, Frederic the French Yard-Man, and people who grow philosophy as well s phlox on their little piece of earth 

May 16, 2019, 4-5PM Pop-UP Concert with Josh Goforth Florence-Lauderdale Public Library

350 N Wood Ave, Florence, AL  

 Storyteller, ballad singer, and multi-instrumentalist Josh Goforth is a native of Madison County in western North Carolina. Situated deep in the Blue Ridge Mountains, this area is known for its keeping of unbroken ballad and storytelling traditions brought by early Scots-Irish and English settlers in the mid-17th century. It was also fertile ground for the rise of American string band music played on fiddle, banjo, and guitar. Proud to share his Appalachian heritage with audiences near and far, Josh Goforth draws from each of these wellsprings. Join us for a FREE pop-up concert with Josh at 4 p.m. on Thursday, May 16 to kick off the Shoals Storytelling Festival!  

May 17, 8:45 AM – 5 PM (with lunch break) The Shoals Storytelling Festival featuring: Donald Davis, Dolores Hydock, Bil Lepp, and Josh Goforth

8:50-9:00 Welcome

9:00-9:30 Bil Lep

9:30-10:30 Josh Goforth

10:30-10:45 Break

10:45-11:30 Dolores Hydock

11:30-12:00 Donald Davis 

12:00—2:00 Lunch

2:00-2:30 Josh Goforth

2:30-3:30 Bil Lep

3:30-3:50 Break

3:50-5:00 Donald Davis (Went home at 5pm)

5:00-7:00 Dinner 

7-9 PM–Storyteller Showcase with Donald Davis, Dolores Hydock, Bil Lepp, and Josh Goforth

May 18, 9AM – 5:15 PM (with lunch break) The Shoals Storytelling Festival featuring: Donald Davis, Dolores Hydock, Bil Lepp, Eric Kirkman, and Josh Goforth

9:00-9:30 Donald Davis 

9:30-10:30 Eric Kirkman

10:30-10:45 Break

10:45-12:00 Dolores Hydock

12:00—2:00 Lunch

2:00-2:30 Bil Lep

2:30-3:00 Josh Goforth

3:00-3:50 Eric Kirkman 

3:50-4:15 Break

4:15-4:45 Dolores Hydock

4:45-5:15 5:00 Donald Davis (Went home at 5pm)

5:15-7:00 Dinner

7-9PM – Performance with Firekid, Dillon Hodges, and Heidi Feek

For the past two, days I have enjoyed spending time with my friends at the Shoals Theater Storytelling Festival.

Friday, we ate lunch at Legends(I think everyone ate lunch there) I enjoyed a plate of fried okra, fried shrimp, and Jack Danial's apples. 

Saturday, my friend and I shared a bowl of white cheese dip and chicken and steak feta for lunch. We topped it off with a cup of their complimentary ice cream.

On Friday and Saturday, we enjoyed listening to the following entertainers
Josh Goforth, Bill Lepp, Donald Davis, Dolores Hydock, and Dr. Eric Kirkman.
Josh Goforth is a multi-talented storyteller who uses a variety of stringed instruments for his ballads and stories.
His stories included friends and relatives, many about his tobacco chewing, never taking the shortcut to hard work grand-paw.
Bill Lepp's believe it or not Paul Bunyon tall tales!
Donald Davis's school days growing up and his jokester father.
Dolores's stories included a white cat, (Huck) a black cat, a speckled cat, and a one-eyed cat and the lessons she learned from them.
Audry Williams her side of the story of fame.
Dr. Eric Kirkman sings and uses musical instruments to tell the African American influence on American music.

Thursday Pop-up Shows 

Cypress Lake Golf & Tennis Club Dolores Hydock told stories about Dishing the Dirt from the Garden and we were served ham, sausage biscuits, fruit, pastries, muffins, orange juice, coffee, and water. There were door prizes.

Florence Library Josh Goforth played the guitar, a banjo, and fiddle, sang ballads, & told stories about life in Madison Couty North Carolina.

The storytelling festival has come to a bittersweet end and cannot wait until next year.

2016 Saturday, May 21, UNA Front Porch Storytelling Festival @UNA

Arrived early and got a seat in the front row.

9:30-10:00 We listened to Geraldine Buckley she talked about her life in Spain and giving spirits to a bunch of nuns.

10:00-10:30 We listened to Tim Lowry 

He talked about teaching Russian Immigrants and Gullah children English & their use of punctuation. 
He told us about how he introduced the Gullah children to the older Russians.
He told us about how a Russian woman changed the life of one of his students, and how he went from hating school to wanting to learn. 

10:45-12:00 We listened to Dolores Hydock tell her experience with meeting Doctor Ruth & Kathryn Tucker Windham.

12:00-1:30 Lunch

We ate lunch-I brought two peanut butter crackers, an orange, a banana, a box of cranberries, and bottled water.

My friend and I had a couple of women from Colorado sit with us.

They had traveled from Colorado, stopping in Arkansas to visit a friend, then traveled to Florence to listen to the storytellers. They were staying at Express Holiday Inn.

They had been to every show, including the evening events.

They were traveling to Birmingham where one of the women was taking the plane to Chicago. The other woman was driving to Atlanta to visit family. She was giving the car that she was driving to her grandson, then she was flying home to Colorado.

Dolores Hydock joined us for lunch. I gave her a peanut butter cracker and a box of cranberries. One of the other women gave her some fruit. We had a great time getting to know one another.

1:30-2:00 We listened to Geraldine Buckley talk about hitchhiking in Canada

2:00-2:30 We listened to Minton Sparks use Bayou singing to tell stories and she told a story about her grandmother. She was accompanied by John Jackson a guitarist.

2:30-3:00 We listened to Bil Lepp talked 

Both my friend and I had to leave during the 3:00PM break.

I had to be at my grandson’s wedding at 5:00PM.

2015 May 16 What door do I use?

A funny thing happened to me today
At the performance center, I had to go to the restroom
Was not sure where it was and ask my friend sitting next to me
She said I don't know,
But when you find it let me know.
I open the double doors leading outside the performance center
The restroom was straight
In front of me.
I used the restroom and started to return but, was not sure what door I came thru

I tried the door in front of me. It would not open!
I looked at the two kids sitting next to the door and said,
"Did I come thru this
Door?"
The 2 kids had this puzzled look on their faces.
I tried the door again.
I looked back at the 2 kids and said, "I guess u have to use the latch
to open the
Door.!
As I walked inside they probably
said,
"What was wrong with that woman!"