 | This article needs additional citations for verification .(December 2019) (Learn how and when to remove this template message) |
Revels is a contemporary series of American seasonal stage performances, incorporating singing, dancing, recitals, and theatrics loosely organized around a central theme or narrative. The folk-tradition-based performances started in 1957, were restarted in 1971, and now occur in multiple cities around the US.
Performances were initially given at Christmas time as the Christmas Revels at Town Hall in New York City in 1957, which involved singing, dancing, recitals, theatrics (usually as brief skits, often humorous), and usually some audience participation, all appropriate to the holiday season. Performers were usually local, often non-professional, and frequently young.[ citation needed ]
The events were founded by John Langstaff as Christmas entertainments; he and his daughter Carol later started producing The Christmas Revels in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1971, at Harvard University's Sanders Theater, where it has frequently played to sold-out houses.[ citation needed ]
Until his death in 2005, Langstaff, assisted by members of his family, led or fostered several similar Revels organizations in various American cities. His ability to "get it done" as well as his teaching and performing style, was admired by children's television producer Jonathan Meath, who was a tenor on two of their CD albums entitled Welcome Yule and Victorian Revels.[ citation needed ]
The present organization, Revels Inc, produces events in ten cities across the United States, including four in the northeast region of the country. Additional seasonal celebratory events mark spring and summer in some cities.[ citation needed ]
The productions echo English theatrical precedents of the 16th century and earlier.[ citation needed ] Professional singers, actors and musicians are mixed with talented amateurs and tradition-bearers, often brought in to share a featured culture's music, dance, or ritual in an authentic manner. There is almost always a children's chorus, which performs songs, dances, and games from the themed period or location. Traditional English Morris dancing is often incorporated, adapted somewhat to the cultural theme of any particular year.[ citation needed ]
Reviewers have especially mentioned the dance and the upbeat nature of the performance. [1]
Each year's Christmas Revels draws upon a different era or culture's Christmas and winter solstice traditions. For example, the 2008 Christmas Revels in Cambridge were based on music, songs, and dance inspired by writer Thomas Hardy's beloved Wessex. The earliest performances drew from medieval English traditions; the Mummers' Play is retained (albeit sometimes altered) no matter what time period or culture is being featured.
There usually is audience singing encouraged during several parts of the performance. Other traditions include ending every first half of the production with Sydney Carter's "Lord of the Dance" hymn. After the last verse, the audience is encouraged to dance along with the cast, out into the lobby of Memorial Hall at the Cambridge Revels performances. [2] Author Susan Cooper wrote a poem for the Christmas Revels production that is recited near the end of the second half of each performance. [3]
The annual celebrations have been expanded to several other American cities, and there exist songbooks, production guides, and commercial recordings to assist those unfamiliar with ancient folk music and dancing.[ citation needed ] The recordings have sometimes included noted performers in the particular folk tradition featured in a given year, such as Appalachian dulcimer player and singer Jean Ritchie, who appeared on 1982's Wassail! Wassail! An Early American Christmas Revels.
The events combine professional paid performers with unpaid volunteers, who often participate in choruses, dances, and crowd scenes. Both adults and children spanning a wide range of ages are present on stage and in the audience. In addition, a large number of volunteers help with behind-the-scenes work, such as costumes, set building, promotion, and fund-raising.[ citation needed ]
As of 2019 [update] , at least ten independent Revels organizations are active in the US:
Entertainment is a form of activity that holds the attention and interest of an audience or gives pleasure and delight. It can be an idea or a task, but is more likely to be one of the activities or events that have developed over thousands of years specifically for the purpose of keeping an audience's attention. Although people's attention is held by different things, because individuals have different preferences in entertainment, most forms are recognisable and familiar. Storytelling, music, drama, dance, and different kinds of performance exist in all cultures, were supported in royal courts, developed into sophisticated forms and over time became available to all citizens. The process has been accelerated in modern times by an entertainment industry that records and sells entertainment products. Entertainment evolves and can be adapted to suit any scale, ranging from an individual who chooses a private entertainment from a now enormous array of pre-recorded products; to a banquet adapted for two; to any size or type of party, with appropriate music and dance; to performances intended for thousands; and even for a global audience.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to theatre:
A Christmas carol is a carol on the theme of Christmas, traditionally sung at Christmas itself or during the surrounding Christmas holiday season. The term noel has sometimes been used, especially for carols of French origin. Christmas carols may be regarded as a subset of the broader category of Christmas music.
The minstrel show, or minstrelsy, was an American form of entertainment developed in the early 19th century. Each show consisted of comic skits, variety acts, dancing, and music performances that depicted people specifically of African descent. The shows were performed by mostly white people in make-up or blackface for the purpose of playing the role of black people. There were also some African-American performers and black only minstrel groups that formed and toured. Minstrel shows lampooned black people as dim-witted, lazy, buffoonish, superstitious, and happy-go-lucky.
Street performance or busking is the act of performing in public places for gratuities. In many countries the rewards are generally in the form of money but other gratuities such as food, drink or gifts may be given. Street performance is practiced all over the world and dates back to antiquity. People engaging in this practice are called street performers or buskers in the United Kingdom. Buskers is not a term generally used in American English.
A concert is a live music performance in front of an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, choir, or band. Concerts are held in a wide variety and size of settings, from private houses and small nightclubs, dedicated concert halls, amphitheatres and parks, to large multipurpose buildings, such as arenas and stadiums. Indoor concerts held in the largest venues are sometimes called arena concerts or amphitheatre concerts. Informal names for a concert include show and gig.
Wassail is a beverage of hot mulled cider, drunk traditionally as an integral part of wassailing, a Medieval Christmastide English drinking ritual intended to ensure a good cider apple harvest the following year.
The tradition of wassailing falls into two distinct categories: the house-visiting wassail and the orchard-visiting wassail. The house-visiting wassail is the practice of people going door-to-door, singing and offering a drink from the wassail bowl in exchange for gifts; this practice still exists, but has largely been displaced by caroling. The orchard-visiting wassail refers to the ancient custom of visiting orchards in cider-producing regions of England, reciting incantations and singing to the trees to promote a good harvest for the coming year. Notable traditional wassailing songs include "Here We Come a-Wassailing", "Gloucestershire Wassail", and "Gower Wassail".
A folk club is a regular event, permanent venue, or section of a venue devoted to folk music and traditional music. Folk clubs were primarily an urban phenomenon of 1960s and 1970s Great Britain and Ireland, and vital to the second British folk revival, but continue today there and elsewhere. In America, as part of the American folk music revival, they played a key role not only in acoustic music, but in launching the careers of groups that later became rock and roll acts.
A Renaissance fair, Renaissance faire or Renaissance festival is an outdoor weekend gathering open to the public and typically commercial in nature, which purportedly recreates a historical setting for the amusement of its guests. Some are permanent theme parks, while others are short-term events in a fairground, winery, or other large public or private spaces. Renaissance fairs generally include an abundance of costumed entertainers or fair-goers, musical and theatrical acts, art and handicrafts for sale, and festival food. Some offer campgrounds for those who wish to stay more than one day.
Russian traditional music specifically deals with the folk music traditions of the ethnic Russian people. It does not include the various forms of art music, which in Russia often contains folk melodies and folk elements or music of other ethnic groups living in Russia.
Pantomime is a type of musical comedy stage production designed for family entertainment. It was developed in England and is performed throughout the United Kingdom, Ireland and in other English-speaking countries, especially during the Christmas and New Year season. Modern pantomime includes songs, gags, slapstick comedy and dancing. It employs gender-crossing actors and combines topical humour with a story more or less based on a well-known fairy tale, fable or folk tale. Pantomime is a participatory form of theatre, in which the audience is expected to sing along with certain parts of the music and shout out phrases to the performers.
The dance and theatre of Laos is the primary dramatic art form of Laos' majority ethnic group, the Lao people. It is shared with the ethnic Lao that inhabit the Isan region of Thailand as well. There are mainly two types of dances, the classical dances performed in the royal courts and the folk dances now associated with morlam.
Traditional Japanese theatre includes kabuki, noh and the puppet theatre, bunraku.
John Langstaff, a concert baritone, and early music revivalist was the founder of the tradition of the Christmas Revels, as well as a respected musician and educator. He attended the Curtis Institute of Music as well as Juilliard.
Jatra is a popular folk-theatre form of Odia theatre, Bengali theatre, spread throughout most of Odia,Bengali speaking areas of the Indian subcontinent, including Bangladesh and Indian states of Odisha,West Bengal, Bihar, Assam and Tripura As of 2005, there were some 55 troupes based in Calcutta's old jatra district, Chitpur Road, and all together, jatra is a $21m-a-year industry, performed on nearly 4,000 stages in West Bengal alone, where in 2001, over 300 companies employed over 20,000 people, more than the local film industry and urban theatre.
Persian theater goes back to antiquity. The first initiation of theater and phenomena of acting can be traced in ceremonial theaters to glorify national heroes and legends and to humiliate the enemy, as in the classics "Soug Sivash" and "Mogh Koshi" (Megakhouni). Ancient Persian theatre and dance was significantly researched by the Greek historian Herodotus of Halikarnassos, who lived during the Persian rule in Greece. In his work Book IX (Calliope), he describes the history of Asian empires and also the Persian wars until 478 BC.
Balkan brass, popularly known by the Serbian name Truba, is a distinctive style of music originating in the Balkan region as a fusion between military music and folk music. In recent years, it has become popular in a techno-synth fusion throughout Europe, and in pop music in the Anglo-American sphere and throughout the world. Songs like Worth It by Fifth Harmony have brought the style to a new audience. In traditional form, it is popular throughout the Balkans, especially in Serbia, North Macedonia, Bulgaria, Moldova and Romania, although the turbo-folk variety attracts larger audiences. The energetic and fast beats encourage dance and are egalitarian, often resulting in participation by the entire audience; this unpretentious relationship with audiences, highly charged energy and loud and joyful performances by highly skilled musicians has contributed to its successes. Fans of bands inspired by Balkan bands, such as Gogol Bordelo, often state that it is a type of music better experienced than listened to.
Sean-nós is a highly ornamented style of unaccompanied traditional Irish singing, and in the singing of Ireland's Gaeltacht.
Mummers' plays are folk plays performed by troupes of amateur actors, traditionally all male, known as mummers or guisers. Historically, mummers' plays consisted of informal groups of costumed community members that visited from house to house on various holidays. Today the term refers especially to a play in which a number of characters are called on stage, two of whom engage in a combat, the loser being revived by a doctor character. This play is sometimes found associated with a sword dance though both also exist in Britain independently.
