4 Tales to Save the World is a brand-new climate crisis storytelling experience online created by Welsh storyteller and musician, Gwilym Morus-Baird and Derbyshire-based, Adverse Camber productions.
Bringing the work of four of Wales’ most exciting new writers vividly to life, 4 Tales to Save the World imagines a world living with climate crisis.
4 Tales to Save the World (in 4 parts) is a series of striking online live performances showcasing storytelling with music and live technology, shining the light on some of the best new writing from Wales – Kate Hamer (shortlisted for The Costa First Novel Prize for The Girl in the Red Coat), João Morais (Described as “a great slice of comic Cardiff urban realism written by a Welsh Irvine Welsh’ – Independent on Sunday); Bethan Dear and Mary-Ann Constantine. Mary-Ann Constantine’s He Lives Upstairs will be performed partly in Welsh.
Each writer brings their own perspective to imagine four possible futures for Wales after climate crisis. Told live by Wrexham storyteller and musician Gwilym Morus-Baird; with striking visuals and electronic music and effects; this absorbing experience is both funny and moving; taking the audience on a different journey to find either hope, despair, or the simple humanity of people.
Gwilym Morus-Baird is a captivating singer, musician and storyteller and Adverse Camber is one of the UK’s most celebrated storytelling companies – creating electric storytelling encounters and new music based on folk traditions to wider audiences across the UK and beyond. 4 Tales to Save the World follows the success of Adverse Camber’s last UK tour, Dreaming the Night Field / Breuddwydio Cae’r Nos: chwedl o Gymru which was a bilingual enchanting production based on the Fourth Branch of the Mabinogion.
4 Tales to Save the World was originally conceived as a live performance featuring all four newly commissioned stories, the events of 2020 have inspired the team to reinvent 4 Tales to Save the World as four finely crafted, individual online events including a live performance of each story, a short documentary offering a unique insight into the writer, plus a Q&A between Gwilym Morus-Baird, the author and the online audience.
Gwilym Morus-Baird said: “One of the things that’s motivated this project is not so much the need to tell people about the climate crisis, but to see if we can find a new perspective on it.
“I think most people accept that we are at the beginning of something; the effects become more obvious every year. But I also know that it’s easy to get used to it, to grow numb to it. I see in myself how this thing called climate change, one of the greatest threats humanity has ever faced, has become background noise in my life.
“So I felt I needed to turn the volume up on it again. To get it out and have a look at it. But I also knew I didn’t want to engage with it as I had done in the past. I wanted to find a new perspective on it, I wanted to change my approach to the whole issue.
“I’ve always known that as a performer the very least I can do is offer a space for people to look at the climate crisis, to explore how they feel about it. Now, with the help of some brilliant authors, the Adverse Camber production company and the Welsh Arts Council, I can do that.”
Tickets are £7 per computer/ipad user and can be purchased through adversecamber.co.uk and via EventBrite.
