OffScript

The second episode of Making Middlemarch brings you conversations straight from the rehearsal room. Listen to cast members Tom Gordon, Amanda Hurwitz and Ryan Van Champion discussing their characters’ fears of change, and how those opinions are realised in the show. Featuring clips of some of the actors reading lines in the rehearsal room and snippets of the show’s sound design. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this first episode of Making Middlemarch, discover how the idea of The Great Middlemarch Mystery was conceived and why the source text’s author, George Eliot, continues to enchant us today.Delve into the inspirations behind this adaptation and the creator’s theatrical visions. Uncover the real life stories from Coventry locals and how they will be woven into the show.Featuring a conversation between creator and director Josephine Burton and co-writer and researcher Ruth Livesey, interspersed with clips from our community workshops in Coventry. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Protest Songs: The InternationaleIn the first episode of our Protest Songs series, we explore the history of 'The Internationale' and how it continues to inspire social change.Josephine Burton speaks to singer-songwriter Billy Bragg, who was motivated by the collapse of communism to rewrite the song and devote an album to it in 1990. Other speakers include historian Robert Service who gives an overview of the history of the song and its many adaptations, including its role as the first national anthem for the Soviet Union and Professor John Street, who discusses his new online resource devoted to English protest songs ‘Our Subversive Voice’, and how music can change the world. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

After its genesis in Berlin and its London premiere, our initial journey of Songs for Babyn Yar culminated in a performance in Kyiv, Ukraine, on 7 December 2021 - the city in which more than 100,000 people were massacred in the ravine of Babyn Yar during Nazi occupation. In this podcast episode, the three artists involved and its director reflect on this climactic performance, and the emotional and creative journey it took to get there. Ukrainian musicians Yuriy Gurzhy, Svetlana Kundish and Mariana Sadovska, alongside director Josephine Burton, discuss their experiences of performing such a raw, personal and emotionally demanding work in their country of origin, to an audience who live in the long shadows of the Babyn Yar massacres. The musicians explore their shared grief, its catharsis, the impact the production has had on audiences worldwide, and the questions it has raised.Songs featured: 'Lullaby for Babyn Yar', 'Mipney Ma', 'Live' and 'Vald' from Songs for Babyn Yar All music was created and recorded in the rehearsal room with Yuriy Gurzhy, Svetlana Kundish and Mariana Sadovska for Dash ArtsIntro music: Fakiiritanssi by Marouf Majidi Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The second in our mini-series of episodes about our Dido's Bar project delves into the creative process of the three artists at the heart of this production.Hear about how director Josephine Burton, playwright Hattie Naylor and composer Marouf Majidi crossed paths and came to collaborate on this project, and how our recent music and creative writing workshops with communities in London and Oxford have inspired and fed into the production.Dido’s Bar is an immersive multi-lingual gig theatre production that reimagines Virgil's Aeneid planned for Autumn 2022 in London, exploring this timeless tale of migration through the lens of the current migrant crisis. Music creditsIntro music: Fakiiritanssi by Marouf Majidi Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

80 years ago this autumn, Nazi occupying forces murdered more than 33,000 Jews in the ravine of Babyn Yar in the suburbs of Kyiv, Ukraine, over just two days. In the following two years of Nazi occupation, Babyn Yar became the site of over 100,000 deaths.This month, Dash Arts marks this anniversary by premiering a new music theatre production, Songs for Babyn Yar, in London and Ukraine with a work-in-progress sharing in Berlin. This performance sees three Ukrainian musicians explore the legacy of these massacres, drawing on survivors' testimonies, traditional Yiddish and Ukrainian folk songs, poetry and storytelling, and asking how we can move forward.This podcast episode reveals the story of the making of the show, its vision and the creative journey we have experienced as we explore how to commemorate atrocity through the medium of performance. Featuring interviews with the show's director Josephine Burton; musicians Yuriy Gurzhy, Svetlana Kundish and Mariana Sadovska; and Dr Uilleam Blacker, Associate Professor of Comparative Russian and East European Culture at UCL.Music creditsSongs featured: Mipney Ma and Rabbi Yuriy's Dance from Songs for Babyn YarAll the music was created and recorded in the rehearsal room with Yuriy Gurzhy, Svetlana Kundish and Mariana Sadovska for Dash ArtsIntro music: Fakiiritanssi by Marouf Majidi Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to the first in a mini-series of podcast episodes dedicated to the creation of our upcoming show Dido's Bar, planned for autumn 2022.Dido's Bar is an immersive site-specific gig theatre production set in a cabaret bar on the borders of Europe that reimagines Virgil's Aeneid, exploring this timeless tale of migration through the lens of Europe today.In this podcast episode, discover the myth of Aeneas, his dramatic flight from Troy, his doomed love affair with Dido and his founding of Rome, and how the myth has retained so much resonance and significance in the context of the questions facing society today. Delve into the inspirations behind the production itself, its origin story and its theatrical vision.Featuring interviews with Josephine Burton, Dido's Bar creator and director; Shadi Bartsch, Guggenheim Laureate and award-winning translator of Penguin Random House's edition of The Aeneid; Liv Albert, creator, host and producer of popular Greek and Roman mythology podcast Let's Talk About Myths, Baby!; and Kurdish Iranian musician Marouf Majidi, Dido's Bar composer whose migration story partly inspired the production. Music creditsMusic from Dido's BarLyrics by Hattie NaylorMusic was created and recorded in the rehearsal room with Marouf Majidi, Samira Brahmia, Tuukka Leppänen, Riku Kantola and Josephine Burton at Meidän Festivaali with Globe Art Point for Dash Arts.Songs featured: Love Spell; Sour CherriesIntro music: Fakiiritanssi by Marouf MajidiLink notesThe Aeneid, translated by Shadi Bartsch: https://shadibartsch.com/books/the-aeneid/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In the final episode of The Identity Series, our investigation into what happens to identity during moments of great national change brings our attention to Brexit and its impact on our own national identities in the UK. What does Europe mean today? What do we want from Europe, post-Brexit? This podcast series forms part of EUTOPIA, our multi-year project that emerged as a direct response to the 2016 EU Referendum; as the UK voted to leave the EU, we felt the need to explore what it means to be European.Speakers include Maria Alberg, founder and director of theatre company Projekt Europa, which makes work by migrant theatre makers in the UK; author and academic Timothy Garton Ash, Professor of European Studies at the University of Oxford; and David Furlong, theatre director and Artistic Director of Exchange Theatre, who presents an excerpt from his monologue Un-Settled.LinksFind out more about and participate in European Moments: https://europeanmoments.com/momentsMusic creditsAlger Alger, by Samira Brahmia (before David's Un-Settled monologue) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this third episode of The Identity Series, we deepen our investigation into fractured national identity across Europe, through one of its most contemporary and violent examples: the collapse of Yugoslavia and subsequent wars that ripped across the former country.Hosted by Josephine Burton, a range of artists and historians discuss the tensions leading up to the collapse and its heartbreaking aftermath. Together, we explore how this shaped the artists born out of it and changed the artistic output of a nation, what Yugoslavia meant to its artists and how that spirit endures today. Speakers include Milena Dragićević Šešić; professor of cultural policy and cultural management and former president of the University of Arts, Belgrade; Alma Ferovic Fazlic, a Bosnian singer and music producer; Maja Milatovic-Ovadia, a theatre director from former Yugoslavia and PhD researcher on devised comedy theatre in the context of post-war reconciliation; and Albanian-born Rigels Hallili, a lecturer in modern history and Balkans culture at Warsaw University's Centre for East European Studies.Music creditsSrebrenica by Fun-Da-Mental, featuring Alma Ferovic Fazlic Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this second episode of The Identity Series, we delve into the fraught and complex topic of empire, examining the decline and collapse of various empires across Europe, their aftershocks and their impact on the identity of their citizens.Speaking to experts and artists from a range of backgrounds, we discuss topics including the legacy of empire, the impact of colonisation, how different cultures and nationalities have shaped British music, and the power of music to shape identity and express displacement.Speakers include Sathnam Sanghera, journalist and best-selling author of Empireland: How Imperialism Has Shaped Modern Britain; Lloyd Bradley, one of the UK's leading black music experts and cultural commentators; and Samira Brahmia, a French-Algerian musician. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.