TRACS (Traditional Arts and Culture Scotland) is looking to appoint a new Festival Director to lead the delivery of the Scottish International Storytelling Festival (SISF) from 2026. Founded in 1989, SISF is the world’s largest celebration of storytelling, anchored in Scotland, a nation of storytellers. SISF takes place in October each year, offering a vibrant … Continued

Multiple sell-outs and packed houses were enjoyed by audiences and participants at this year’s Scottish International Storytelling Festival (22 October to 1 November), which is supported by Multi-Year funding from Creative Scotland and the Scottish Government’s Festivals EXPO Fund. The festival’s programme, themed under ‘Lights of the North’, included live storytelling, music, art, and song.  … Continued

As Halloween approaches the tales being told at this year’s Scottish International Storytelling Festival begin to take a darker turn… On Halloween night (Friday 31 October), storyteller Anna Lehr will present her new storytelling show Dazwischen (Inbetween) which is inspired by the original tales of the Brothers Grimm, especially the story of Godfather Death. Anna … Continued

* Elegies is the first dance adaptation for the screen and stage of Hamish Henderson’s series of poems Elegies for the Dead in Cyrenaica, specifically curated to premiere as part of the 34th edition of the Scottish International Storytelling Festival at Edinburgh’s Scottish Storytelling Centre on 11 November 2023 and available to tour thereafter. * … Continued

We are delighted to announce a new partnership with Caledonian MacBrayne Hebridean and Clyde Ferries. The three-year support of the festival starts with the Year of Scotland’s Coasts and Waters and continues until the 2022 festival, which will take place in the Year of Scotland’s Stories. Aligned with this year’s festival theme, In the Flow, … Continued

Tell us an interesting feature of traditional storytelling in your country. Indigenous storytelling is very diverse and is only in the last 20 years beginning to make a comeback with many of the younger generation discovering their own through knowing the ancient stories. How did you become a storyteller? My grandmother was a great teller, … Continued

Tell us an interesting feature of traditional storytelling in your country. Troll is an important part of the traditional stories told, and there are some stories all children grows up with. In Norway, we are so lucky to have the Cultural Rucksack Programme. The Cultural Rucksack programme is part of the government’s cultural policy. It … Continued

Tell us an interesting feature of traditional storytelling in your country. Storytelling of our oral histories has been carried through song and dance for the Indigenous people of the Northwest Coast of Canada for thousands of years. Our word for oral history translates to coming from the ice, meaning that our stories go back to … Continued

Tell us an interesting feature of traditional storytelling in your country.  Traditional storytelling in Canada consists of different strands reaching back to Indigenous storytelling traditions, European traditions, and other immigrant and local traditions. I grew up in a multi-cultural neighbourhood in Hamilton, Ontario, where the city’s steel mills attracted families from around the world. As … Continued

Tell us an interesting feature of traditional storytelling in your country. I live in the city of Toronto, one of the greatest crossroads cities in the world. It’s in the traditional territory of the Haudenosaunee people, the First People to live here before others came. The Toronto Storytelling Festival, which began in 1978, has become … Continued