Old Timey Music and Storytelling & LITTLE BIRDIE
     
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LITTLE BIRDIE Music and Storytelling

Repertoire includes:

Appalachian Jack and Molly tales with traditional music.

English, German, Russian, Irish, Cajun, Tales from the West, Native American,  Japanese Folk Tales, with related folk songs and music.

 Pennsylvania Tales and Haunted Stories.

The Ole Homestead tales and Old Timey Music.

Quilt Stories with music and dance.

Sing and Dance Folk Tales. All sort of tales come to life with singing and dance. (Everyone gets in dance, sing and join the band in bringing great tales to life)

Moon lore and Sun lore.

Green Man Tales/ May Day Lore (music, dance and puppetry)

Fairy Tales with colorful props, music, puppetry, dance and more.

Mermaid and Pirate tales.

Victorian tales.

Christmas stories from around the world with music.

Winter Solstice Tales and music. (music, dance, masks, giant puppets)

Animal tales (from around the world.) Animal songs, animal instruments, dance and more. 

Nature lore, Flower and fairy lore from around the world. Bird Tales. Tree legends. Star tales. These stories and songs are very interactive. (Ruthanne has performed at Winterthur Gardens and wrote the Greenman Song for this special event.) Beautiful fairy puppets, colorful doodle bugs, bug dances, fairy dances, giant butterfly puppet, giant bird puppets, giant forest king, fairy wings, fariy instrument, elf drums, nature masks and more.

Stories for girls. (powerful wonderful girl tales. Heroic girls and their adventure tales from around the world.)  GIRLS RULE!! With all girl music and all girl dance.

Rose Stories
The adventures of Rose Holly, a small town girl who heads to the big city. Small town short stories from Rose Holly.

Garden Goddess
Garden tales from nine unforgettable glorious garden gals.Garden romances, garden horror stories, garden tips, garden humor, garden divas, want a be garden gals, garden wars and more........Great stories for those who love to garden or need garden inspiration.

Aphrodite's Of The Stage.
Stories from a bevy of bold, beautiful, brave and bedazzling female performers of early vaudeville and the Wild West Stage. Women entertainers a head of their time.

Elder Tales - Beautiful elder tales collected from around the world. Enjoyable and inspiring for all age audience.

Feisty, adventurous, magicical and memorable elders from around the world. Unforgettable elders......full of wisdom, grace, humour, energy, creativity, knowledge and charm.   

Hat Girls.
One storyteller, 12 women and girls and many great hats.

Old Timey Songs and Stories with Railroad Annie Rose 

Angel Stories/Angel Songs and Angel Folk Art for all ages.

 

PAST STORYTELLING AND OLD TIMEY SONG PERFORMANCES INCLUDE.... Black Sheep Festival, The Walnut Street Theater, Adriene Theater, Lousianna Childrens Museum, Heritage Dance Festival, NOMAD, Pittsburgh Children's Museum, Dance Flurry, Christmas Markets at Bethlehem, Pa. Winterthur Museum and Gardens, Musikfest, The Frankford Arts Festival, The Appalachian String Band Festival/Clifftop, Dramarama of New Orleans, The Philadelphia Fringe Festival, Kraine Theater in New york City, , Perry County Arts Festival, Clark Park Festival, May Day Faire Festival at Sproutwood Farm, Children's Fest in New Orleans, Blue Ridge Puppetry Festival, South East National Puppetry Conference and Festival.

Ruthanne was a winner of the CEC New Edge Mix Performance residency for "Mutsmeg". (An Appalachian Folk Tale.)
Blue Rose Moon and Ruthanne offer related acting, storytelling, improvisation, radio skits, puppetry(shadow puppets, easy to construct puppets, giant puppetry), playwrighting and creative movement worshops that follow up storytelling and theater events. Classes are also offered seperate of productions. Email us at bluerosemoon@dandy.net for more information.
Kevin O'Brien has joined up with Little Birdie music. (Fiddle, ukuleles, percussion, vocals) Little Birdie gets to have much fun working on Old Time Music to Swing, Western Swing, Celtic, Folk and more with Kevin's great talents. He also brings a fresh fun sound to our vintage collection of children's songs with his great ukulele stlye. He has recorded with Larry Unger (Rags, Blues and Hot Tunes for Finger Style Guitar) He has won numerous fiddle contests. Some of those include the Lowell National Fiddle Contest; Hunterdon Fiddle Contest; Fireback Fiddle Contest. Founding member of The Ukestra, Cambridge, MA.
Little Birdie is an eclectic mix of Old Timey Music, American Rural Music, Early Jazz, Folk Music, Original Songs, storytelling and whimsical stage show. Ruthanne E. Ankney (Actress, storyteller and musician) along with her very special Little Birdie friends (Kevin O'Brien and Carl Baron) delight big kids and little kids with their unique performance style, talented musicianship, vocals, spellbinding stories and one of a kind frolicking stage show Our style is lively, engaging, folksy, fantastical, lots of fun and cleverly interactive. Wonderful vintage childrens songs, old time music, folk lore, and folk music are dusted off and come to life with a menagerie of magical instruments, colorful costumes, giant props, everyday pots, pans, spoons and brooms. Giant puppets dance to music. A bevy of dancing clothespin dolls and limber jacks add great flaire and fun to old favorites like Buffalo Gals. A Giant Moon Man, who plays on his ladle is created by the audience. Louis Armstrong's Dummie Song gets played with a menagerie of string instruments and kids help to build and dance with one big darlin dummy. Join in the Welcoming of the Green Man ceremony. Take a chair in the ukulele orchestra; swing with our musical brooms, join our animal stomp, chase a frog for a hoecake, dance the Killy Kranky or the Limberjack Jig and more. Band Members of Little Birdie........ Ruthanne E. Ankney: Ukulele, Banjolele, Percussion, Limberjacks, Vocals, Storytelling and Puppetry. Kevin O'Brien: Fiddle, Ukulele, Percussion, Vocals. Carl Baron: Jug, Tin whistle, Woodwinds, Banjo, Banjo-Guitar, Percussion, Vocals.

 
Meet another member of Little Birdie......Carl Baron. Carl is extraordinary. He is a walking library of so many old songs, orgins of tunes and music history. He is a great musician. (Banjo, banjo-guitar, fiddle, guitar, whistle, clarinet, jug, percussion, and vocal). Carl has been strongly influenced by the fiddlers of West Virginia (in particular, Melvin Wine), jug band and ragtime music, Woody Guthrie, Leadbelly and Jimmy Rogers. He has played with the Juggernaut Stringband and is presently a member of the old time band, Hobo Pie. Carl is also a member of the Eastern European ensemble, Zima. Check out more information about Carl at hobopie.com. Frank Basile (guitar, banjo, vocals) and Kim Basile (great blues fiddle and vocals & their great kids Artemis and Paris join in with fiddles, ukulele...and some great buck dancing) join us when they can. To learn about Frank and Kim go to http://www.donegone.net

 
Dreaming Under the Appalachian Moon (storytelling and song) was performed at the Walnut Street Theater Studio Five.

Featured Old Timey Songs....Little Birdie, Moonshiner, Fine Sally, The Brown Girl, Gathering Flowers, Wish I was A Single Girl Again, Little Shoes, Babes in the Woods, Wayfering Stranger and more.

Vocals and banjo with Laura Baird.

 
   
 

Laura Baird....vocals, banjo and fiddle. Laura performs Old Timey Music with The Baird Sisters. (Philadelphia, New York and Princeton areas.)