Thursday 10 October

The Art of Performance

A Performance Skills Workshop with Raine Geoghegan

Learn how to be confident and effective when reading your work aloud. Suitable for writers of all genres.
How can we free the breath so that it works for us?
What techniques are there to enable us to ground ourselves, feel confident and read our poetry and stories with ease and grace?
What stops us from enjoying the process of reading aloud?
Raine will take us through guided exercises to explore the way in which we use breath, posture and mind when reading our work aloud. She will highlight the restrictions that we put upon ourselves and give clear instructions on how to release them, enabling a more relaxed and calm presentation. We will learn how to stand like an oak tree with our roots going deep into the earth, our spine long and strong, thus enabling a pure flow of energy to be transformed into performance. Raine will also address issues arising from disability and anxiousness.
Each participant is asked to bring a poem, short story or a passage from a novel or song that they would like to work on. Please also bring a notepad and a few coloured pens. The session will end with a mini showcase of the final presentations.

Raine Geoghegan has an MA in Creative Writing from the University of Chichester. Born in the Welsh Valleys, she is half Romany with Welsh and Irish ancestry. She writes poetry, monologues, songs, short prose and flash fiction. For many years she was a professional actor and dancer. She also directed plays as well as devising and facilitating Theatre and Personal Development workshops. She founded ‘Writing from the Heart’, a Creative Writing and Personal Growth Programme in 2011. Her poems and other writing have been published both online and in print with Under the Radar; Romany Routes Journal; Poetry Ireland Review; The Clearing; The Travellers Times; The Ofi Press and many more. Her work was featured in a documentary film, ‘Stories from the Hop Yards’ which was shown at the Ledbury Poetry Festival, alongside her reading. Her first pamphlet ‘Apple Water: Povel Panni’ was launched in December 2018. It was chosen as one of the 2019 Spring Selections by the Poetry Book Society. Her second pamphlet will be published later this year by Hedgehog Poetry Press. She is a Pushcart Prize; Best of the Net; and Forward Prize nominee.

Review of the meeting

Richard introduced Raine Geoghegen (website here ). Raine’s writing has been inspired by her Romany heritage. She told us that presenting her poems had led her back to performance, something she had given up after an accident. Raine presented a workshop called ‘The Art of Performance.’

The workshop was immersive, and all of us were encouraged to take part.