Telling tales: Outdoor storytelling festival ignites imagination in natural setting
According to O'Callahan, Mt. Timpanogos Park in Provo Canyon — the main site for the long-running festival — boasts "these beautiful canyons, red rocks and natural wonders the likes of which you've never seen."
The canyon "is an ideal setting for storytelling, and it says more than words can possibly express," he said in an interview from his Marshfield, Mass., home.
Of course, "sometimes that makes it a challenge to keep the audience interested in what you're saying. You have to choose your words very carefully," he added with a laugh.
O'Callahan has been a professional "tall teller of tales" for 30 years, earning several awards in the process. And his travels have taken him around the world. He's performed in Europe and New Zealand as well as at the 1980 Winter Games in Lake Placid. He is also a regular presence on National Public Radio.
As his gushing would suggest, he has also been to the annual Timpanogos Storytelling Festival and is returning to perform at this year's festival.
O'Callahan will also conduct a morning workshop, "Dream Your Dreams."
In addition to more "traditional" storytellers like O'Callahan, this year's dozen-plus festival acts include Antonio Rocha, a Brazilian-born actor who breaks the "traditional" mime silence by talking while he performs.
Rocha studied under Tony Montanaro, a student of the legendary French mime Marcel Marceau. However, he uses mime in a different way, one that "illustrates lessons from different aspects of life.
"Using the versatile yet simple nature of (both silent and spoken) art forms, I help the audience and workshop participants activate their imagination through rich symbolism and imagery," he explained.
Rocha said he is excited to come to the Orem-based event. He was asked to perform at the 2007 festival but had a scheduled event in Singapore. "I am glad that (festival organizers) kept a date open for me after I already told them no."
He spent the week before the Timp festival touring the Southwest and Utah's national parks, and said he is "certainly going to have a lot of new stories to tell."
And like O'Callahan, Maine resident Rocha also calls New England home. "We're a tight-knit, family-like community. We cross paths with each other on the road so often that it feels like we're at home."
While many of this year's storytellers, puppeteers, musicians and other performers are touring acts, there are some local features as well, including the state's longest-running bluegrass act, the Stormy Mountain Boys.
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