Welcome to our programme of events for 2008
As last year, we shall be presenting a season of outdoor Enchanted Evenings around Manchester, in Manchester City Centre (Albert Square) and in our favourite park Platt Fields, in Fallowfield.
And in addition, we are working with other organisations to present events and festivals here and in their towns; and occasionally we are able to hold our own special projects. In all, we aim to give the greatest enjoyment and pleasure to the largest range of people ... our slogan as always remains:
all ages ... all cultures ... all weekend!
Here is the programme in date order. This is followed by detailed information on each project, with the Enchanted Evenings listed together, followed by other events.
Some up-to-date and very comprehensive access and accommodation details can be found on our xtrax.org.uk website...
May 24-26: Liverpool
Streets Ahead Liverpool City Centre
Sat / Sun eves; Sun / Mon afternoons
Free
 We're delighted to be reviving our city centre international street festival Streets Ahead for Liverpool 08 (Capital of Culture). The main fearures of Streets Ahead are shows all over the place for family audiences ... whenever you turn around there's another ... our aim is for you to go home exhausted and you still haven't seen everything!
During the daytime, the length of road from Bold St down to Derby Square will be buzzing with circus, music, street theatre and dance, installations, puppets and a few very special treats including Milan’s la Scala opera house recreated (in Derby Square), dozens of human shop window displays (on Bold Street) and a giant neurotic compost heap in (Williamson Sq - along with The Man Who Breathes through his Eyes, BelleVue - 30 seconds that will change your life - and street dance in the fountains from France! Highlights include giant dragons from Spain, aerial acrobatics round a giant ball, ....
We shall be on St Georges Plateau during the evenings (similar programme both evenings) 8.00 - 10.30pm. We shall build up each evening with a sequence of wonderful experiences, starting with a masleta of firecrackers on Saturday to get the festival off to a cracking start . The shows include the chance to be part of a giant dragon family, brought by Catalan wizards Sarruga (and of course in search of St George ..); waterfalls galore under the gaze of the Wellington memorial, courtesy of Avanti Display (UK); and the magic of Argentinian aerial acrobatics teeming around an illuminated ball above our heads. Capital of Culture on the Streets - be there!
A full programme of all the entertainment will be available throughout the event - cost £1. If you wish to look at the companies coming in advance, so as to plan your visit, click here: www.liverpool08.com
Friday June 6, Saturday June 7 and Sunday June 8
Feast! Picnic by the Lake
Platt Fields Park, Wilmslow Road, Manchester M14 6LA.
Friday 7 - 11pm; Saturday 5 - 11pm; Sunday 1 -6pm
Free
 Third year of Manchester's mass picnic in the park, with entertainment all round the lakeside.Feast! is for everyone - families, groups and friends of every interest and culture, round the lakeside in Platt Fields. Outdoor theatre, circus, strolling musicians, magic, puppetry, games and activities, delicious food and good company in a heady mix, spanning two summer evenings and a Sunday afternoon. You bring the food, picnic blanket, decorations, candles and whatever other extravaganza you wish, we provide the entertainment. Sit round the lake, up on the hills, under trees, on banks, at tables and on blankets … come with candlesticks, lamps, nightlights, banners or canopies … dress to draw attention, hang things on branches, surround yourselves with flowers ....
And bring your picnic ... large, small, gourmet, health-conscious! We've seen huge pans of couscous, delicious smelling barbecues, African banquets, quiches and pies, salads and stews, fragrant spices, bittersweet coffee, pizzas with pizzaz!… and thousands of mixed picnics with a little of everything! (And if you have no time to prepare something yourself, there is hot and cold food from around the world available to buy on site … including a wicked chocolate fountain!)
This year we run for longer, with a larger programme of outdoor theatre, music, dance, circus, strolling musicians, games and activities from the UK and abroad. You can watch and listen, make things, or go boating and canoeing on the lake ... or wait for a musician, poet, storyteller or magician to serenade you at your table ... until nightfall when we end with a different finale each evening. Friday sees a fiery spectacle to gaze at, with special moments of pyrotechnic wizardry; Saturday you can watch a luminescent garden appear out of the darkness. So you'll just have to come both nights ....
 Sunday afternoon a world-music stage will run all afternoon, alongside thze rest o the entertainment, courtesy of newly formed Manchester agency Lingua Franca.
And amongst all this, chill out in our games area, weave a chapati picnic tray, create your own banner or make a lantern to add to the brightly coloured ones dancing on the water.
Feast is a weekend for everyone to share - the event is yours to enjoy asz you wish .. laugh together, look out for each others children, taste each other’s picnics; and most importantly, share unique moments that will never be repeated. Watch teenagers enjoying themselves (while trying hard to remain cool); older men blowing giant bubbles; women giggling under their burkas; grannies regally surveying the crowds (perhaps remembering the park 50 years ago); parents watching their children’s amazement (and sometimes fear) at a myriad of strange visitors.
Be continental and keep your children with you all evening - by the end of the event, if not fast asleep they will be gazing with round tired eyes at adults being children again!
A full programme of all the entertainment will be available at the event - cost £1. If you wish to look at the companies coming in advance, so as to plan your visit, click here: www.xtrax.org.uk
Prizes for the best picnic area each day.
Once again, we are collaborating on this project with the international showcasing organisation x.trax, who will be inviting programmers interested in outdoor performance from across the UK and abroad to watch the shows with the audience. If you are a programmer and would like to register to attend for the weekend, please contact x.trax directly - they organise several other activities alongside the festival of interest to professionals in the outdoor performance sector.
 “So impressed with numbers participating and atmosphere at the FEAST event.......you have some kind of special touch”
“It was dusk, the light was pink, children and adults were at play and all was right with the world. Thank you again for having the vision and the staying power to provide these wonders to Manchester people. I felt I had come home. “
“Brilliant, brilliant, BRILLIANT festival! Better and better each year! Long may it continue”
“Thanks for your latest extravaganza. Magical as ever, our twin daughters (aged 3) were bewitched, wide awake last night with the wonder of the Feast. ”“I, and everyone I could see, was captivated by the tuba players floating in the boats at the end of this year's Picnic in the park”
How to find us: Platt Fields Park (M14 6AL) is 2 miles from Manchester City centre and well served by buses 40 – 49, 157, 53. There will be a staffed carpark all weekend. Price £3 per car, disabled parking free.
July 16 - 20
Carpet of Flowers
Albert Square, Manchester City Centre
Free
 As part of Manchester in Bloom, we have commissioned Manchester-based artist Jo Vickers to design an intricate pattern to be laid out in scented flowers across Albert Square, with the help of 100 volunteers..
Jo was responsible for the wonderful 'Wallflowers' project, that was displayed vertically in Pïccadilly Gardens during Easter 2006. She designed an image of three pink roses which stood out strikingly against the predominant 'grey' of that square. Jo will again look for the most colourful selection of flowers in season, including those with a heady perfume, to intoxicate visitors upon arrival!
The carpet of flowers will be on display every day until dusk. We hope to fiund a way to give you an aerial view of the finished cqrpet, as it will look most spectacular seen from above.
If you would like to take part in the project, we shall be recruiting from Feast onwards. If you would like to volunteer to help make the carpet (and it was the most intoxicating experience last time (with everyone completely 'high' on fragrance!) please phone 0161 224 0020
Friday July 25 - Sunday July 27
Urban Moves
International Festival of Outdoor and site specific Dance
Manchester City Centre
Free
We are thrilled to be able to work with digm (Dance Initiative greater Manchester) to co-present this weekend once again ( we had hope to be able to do it last summer, but were unable to raise sufficient money to make it really interesting). As we write this, we are still developing the programming, which you can find in detail on the website: wwwurbanmovesfestival.co.uk
But the idea is to present around 10 different companies in spaces that especially enhance their work and show it in the most imaginative ways, somewhere in the City Centre.
We shall mark all venues clearly so you can find them easily. Presented jointly with digm.
Thursday August 21 - Monday August 25
Nicole et Martin Circus (Switzerland )'Tall Tales in the White Tent'
Platt Fields Park, Wilmslow Road, Manchester M14 6LA.
Tickets £8; children £4 (recommended for aged 5 and over)
Box Office: Contact Theatre 0161 274 0600
 We are delighted to bring this wonderful storytelling-circus duo to Manchester - to bring a little magic to the end of the holidays.
Nicole et Martin are exquisite storytellers, captivating adults and children alike. The shows work best for them when their audience is adults and children together Nicole et Martin bring to Manchester a selection of Grimm`s fairy tales, performed in the intimacy of their unique circular white tent, constructed entirely with curving wooden poles covered with white canvas and seating 200. Around it are sited their traditional caravans, where they live ... and another smaller tent where they meet the audience and sell drinks and gingerbread from Hansel and Gretel's witch's house!
 The two performers become a myriad of different characters in the cleverest of ways and engage the audience in their stories with a succession of skillful acrobatics, music, puppetry, movement and storytelling.
They are utterly compelling - they can involve even the tiniest children in helping them, yet keep adults constantly absorbed. They will be performing 3 different stories during their time with us. Each show last approximately 70mins.
Thurs 21 / 3pm / HANSEL AND GRETEL
Fri 22 / 3pm / HANSEL AND GRETEL
Sat 23 / 7pm / THE FISHERMAN AND HIS WIFE
Sun 24 / 3pm / THE FISHERMAN AND HIS WIFE
Mon 25 / 3pm / THE MUSICIANS OF BREMEN
“As performers they are irresistible” (The Times)
“humour, music and eye-popping acrobatics that leave the audience wide-eyed with wonder” (The Scotsman)
Winners of the Tapwater-Award and Sold-Out Award (Edinburgh Festival 2006)
For early arrivals we will have activities and games for children.
How to find us: Platt Fields Park (M14 6AL) is 2 miles from Manchester City centre and well served by buses 40 – 49, 157, 53. There will be a staffed carpark all weekend. Price £3 per car, disabled parking free.
Other events we are involved with programming include a season in the Lake District entitled 'Lakes Alive'. Info on all events www.lakesalive.org
June 14 Bowness, Cumbria 'Windermere on Water'
Free
An evening for families on the Glebe, watching music and theatre, culminating in a performance of Mobil'Homme by acclaimed French company Transe Express - a dozen drummers suspended in the air from a crane - a giant human mobile!
August Tour of Nicole et Martin Circus (Switzerland)
'Tall Tales in the White Tent'
Information on the shows as above for MIA.
Dates, places, times and prices www.lakesalive.org
August 29 and 30 Roadshow!
In 2 South Lakeland towns
Information on the shows as above for MIA.
Dates, places, times and prices www.lakesalive.org
August 29 - 31
Mintfest Street Festival
Kendal Town Centre, Cumbria
mostly Free ( a few shows to pay, including Nicole et Martin)
End of the summer Streets Ahead-style festival around Kendal's intimate town centre all weekend. A host of international and British companies. Unusual shows ... including a special musical treat on the top of Kendal Castle Hill ... by torchlight.
Presented by Kendal Arts International (KAI), programmed by MIA;
For the full programme: www.mintfest.org
Pease have a look at the archived 2007 Projects and Events...
Pease have a look at the archived 2006 Projects and Events...
If you would like to read a report of one of our previous projects, click here...
If you would like to see comments from audiences, click here...
If you would like to get involved in any of our projects, click here...
If you would like to go to our home page and find out what else we do, click here...
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