News and Events

TALES Alberta is proud to host SC-CC in the city of festivals, Edmonton, Alberta. From May 23-28, the SC-CC 2017 Conference, 150 Golden Threads - The Building of a Nation will celebrate the creation, growth and development of Canada through the medium of story; the Trails, Rails and TALES of the peoples and events that formed who we are! The conference will be combined with the annual TALES Festival in the Old Strathcona area. This is fantastic partnership allows visiting tellers to participate in the SC-CC conference as well as have opportunities to take in performances, have paid gigs, while enjoying wonderful professional development workshops, meetings with special guests and exciting tours!

Alberta tellers applied in 2010 to host the annual conference for 2017 specifically because it was Canada’s 150^th birthday and we felt that we could provide a wonderful event to celebrate how our nation was built over the last century and a half through the unique and beautiful medium of traditional storytelling.  It is our intent to have a strong Alberta influence of the building of Canada.  

Our Alberta heritage is incredible and be highlighted through a tour of Edmonton on the 1929 Street Car with a period persona guide.  Immediately following that tour, participants will meet several influential women from Alberta’s past for Tea, including some members of the Famous Five. We'll wrap up with a Suffrage Sing-Along! We will have the opportunity to have a First Nation Elder from our own Treaty 6 area give an in-depth experience with the nationally acclaimed ‘Blanket Exercise’ to lend greater understanding of the history of our First Nations from their point of view since the arrival of Europeans.  

We will have an opportunity to link strongly with the Francophone community in Alberta and in particular, in the city of Edmonton with workshops and concerts and encourage our Francophone tellers to travel to outlying areas to visit schools and libraries.  We encourage all of our travelling tellers to take advantage of the conference occurring during the school year, and seek out schools throughout the province that they can visit while they are here. [Note: for those interested in telling in schools, we strongly encourage you to begin contacts and arrangements as soon as possible.  School budgets are set in the first few months for the entire school year so waiting until spring to make arrangements could be disappointing.  TALES will not make arrangements for school visits; all tellers are responsible for their own.  Listing of Alberta School Districts and individual schools readily available online.]

CONFERENCE PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT:

See workshops and Master Class pages for details

Selection: Master Class  

Choose from Monday May 22nd OR Tuesday, May 23, 2017 (additional cost)

Marva Blackmore – Telling What You Know

Location: 11840 87 Avenue, one block West of Lister Conference Centre on the North side of the street

Selection: Choice of one 3 hour session -  Thursday, May 25, 2017 

1] Holly Robison – Body Language Power 

2] Anne Glover and Jennifer Ferris – Creating Your Version 

3] Ginger Mullen & Melanie Ray – Of Tristan and Tam Lin: Tellers and Their  Scholarly Ways

Selection: Choice of two 1 ½ hour sessions  Friday, May 26, 2017

1] Glenda Bristow – First Nation Blanket Exercise 

2] Glenda Bristow – First Nation Blanket Exercise 

3] Gilbert Parent – Les Boucheron: Voyageur Song and Dance

4] Mary Hays – Vocal Care 

5] Mary Hamilton – All Together Now: Crafting and Telling Audience Participation Tales 

6] David Merleau – FM Storytelling Radio Production

CONFERENCE PRICING 

*Online registration opens January 9th, 2017

$245.00 Members Early Bird Special (ends February 6, 2017)

$300.00 Members February 7 2017 – May 15, 2017 (registration closes May 15)

$355.00 Non-Members

$100.00 Partner Program includes entrance to all tours and evening events for 1 guest of an attending delegate.

$150.00 Master Class (registration closes May 15)