When You Were Born A Storm Rolled In
Saturday Live Scratch | Curated by The Bare Project
Bank Street Arts, Sheffield | 2016
The only indisputable fact about Welsh queen Gwenllian ferch Gruffydd is that she was killed leading a small group of soldiers, including her two young sons, into battle against the Normans in 1136.
Tierra wanted to tell her story, but she had to make some of it up—okay, nearly all of it—so it is really a question of whether this tale of pride, cowardice, fear of failure, and being a woman is about Gwenllian or about Tierra. This is the first script BARK has written in the style of live-construction—an epic journey told in an intimate way by one performer.
The Structure
This is a script-based, live-constructed piece. Using original script, Tierra Izzo live-constructed soundscapes by using looping technology (the same kind you'll see musicians use in concert). With a combination of human-made soundscape, song, and story, this simple tale will transport you into another place.
Performed & Created by: Tierra Izzo
“I like it when theatre really owns the fact that it works through a suspension of disbelief...”
Sound
This is a short sample of vocal, live-looped soundscape and song created by Tierra Izzo live in performance.
“I felt like I was in a Welsh march. It was extremely striking and I would love to see more of that.”
Review
Review from The State Of The Arts by Samantha Williams | 2016
Setting off the experimental tone of the evening, Tierra Bonser of London-based performance company BARK, gave an intense sole performance of When You Were Born A Storm Rolled In, a series of excerpts from a script by Bonser based loosely on Welsh queen Gwenllian ferch Gruffydd. Like a group of primary school children eagerly waiting at story-time, we got comfy in any space available on the gallery floor and waited for the tale of Gwenllian to unfold. Using only her voice as a tool, Bonser created a series of emotive scenes with a combination of speech and live recordings which she played back on loop to construct layers of atmosphere. This devising technique that BARK calls ‘live construction’ allowed the audience to experience the fascinating ways that the actress could utilise her voice to create rhythm and tempo, encouraging our imagination to not just hear but see the pouring rain, the army marching to war, the searing howl of a she-wolf. As the piece picked up speed, and jumped from one moment in Gwenllian’s fictitious life to another, I felt myself being carried away from the stark white gallery to a bloodstained field. A riveting example of how technology can aid a performer to create something memorable with very little.