CONTENTS
Summer Film Project for Young People – Azita
Mindwalking – Mumbai visit
See it, Say it, Stop it! - DVD project
Refugee Week Cabaret - review
BandBazi Youth Circus Theatre classes start again Sep 11
New BandBazi website!
Follow BandBazi on Twitter and join our Facebook group
Summer Film Project for Young People – Azita
Young people aged 11-18 are invited to take part in our summer film project which runs from 3-8 August – 10am til 5pm each day. (The first day will be at Young Peoples Centre, 69 Ship St, Brighton, BN1 1AE).
We have funding from First Light digital film and media initiative to make a short film called ‘Under 18 Prisoner - Azita’ about a young asylum seeker held in a detention camp in the Netherlands. Majid Jafargholi, a budding film-maker from our Youth Circus Theatre, will be directing it. During the project participants will have the opportunity to act, to learn to use the video camera, to take stills photos and to work on sound recording.
There will also be an opportunity to work on composing music on a different date.
There is no charge for attending the film project but we expect participants to commit to all of the 6 days.
To register contact Ian on 01273 245584 or email
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BandBazi/ Q Theatre Productions - Mindwalking – Mumbai visit
As we reported last month BandBazi is commissioning Award winning playwright Tanika Gupta to write the play Mindwalking. The Arts Council have agreed funding for the commission and we hope to tour the production in Autumn 2011.
In June 2010 BandBazi’s Artistic Director Philippa Vafadari, the director John Binnie and Tanika visited Mumbai for an intensive 10 days with Q Theatre Productions (the co-producers) of workshops, research, and casting funded by The British Council’s Connections Through Culture programme. Quasar and Toral from Q Theatre Productions were the 'fixers' in Mumbai strategically arranging the meetings/rehearsals/hospitality.
An exciting time was had exploring the world of Indian theatre and appreciating all the cultural differences. They had a very good meeting with film actor Naseeruddin Shah about the possiblity of his involvement in the piece - depending on his schedule. You can read more about the trip on Philippa’s blog on the Sustained Theatre website http://bit.ly/bdF7hr
It will be an exciting unique piece of circus theatre, combining evocative trapeze imagery and new writing. An elderly Parsee Indian man living in the UK has dementia, and has been placed in care home by his daughter. In his mind it is Bombay 70 years earlier and he has reverted to speaking his native Gujarati, while his family only speaks English. They have to find new, non verbal ways to communicate.
See It, Say It, Stop It! - Religious and Racially Motivated Incidents DVD project
BandBazi's has just finished making the film See It! Say It! Stop It! which will be shown at a celebration event for the participants in mid July.
See It! Say It! Stop It! was commissioned by Brighton and Hove City Council’s Healthy Schools department and Community Safety Partnership as an educational resource to encourage young people to challenge and report racist and religiously motivated bullying.
A group of over 20 young people drawn from BandBazi’s Youth Circus Theatre and Varndean School came together for the project which was devised in Saturday workshops and then filmed around February half-term 2010.
Refugee Week Cabaret - review
Many thanks to everyone that participated in, or attended, the Refugee Week Cabaret on Jun 13 at Pavilion Theatre. The event was a great success and was a complete sell out.
We had poetry reading and dance from Flavi Bumba, slings and bungee pieces by participants of the Hip Hop Circus project we ran after Easter, a BandBazi Youth Circus Theatre poi display, a beautiful solo rope performance by Shahrokh Mahmoodi, juggling from Craig Bourne and a BandBazi Youth Circus Theatre comedy trapeze performance.
We also had films:- 'What is Race' by Big Lew, Mrisi and Jamal, 'Here and There: Here and my Home Country' by RASP and another music video - Rhiannon James’ ‘Inner Self’.
The evening finished with live music from RASP, Simo Lagnawi, playing traditional Moroccan music and Mensur Munshi playing Ethiopian pop whilst the audience took over the stage!
We’d like to thank: Vandu Language Services, Audioactive, RASP, David Churchill, Novas Scarman, Brighton Voices in Exile, Lucy Bryson and the Brighton and Hove City Council Partnership Community Safety Team, Zina Bratovic at SIS, Maria Lloyd, Rhiannon Wheeler at ITV Fixers, Streetfunk, Paolo Baldrini, Hannah King, Majid Jafargholi, Alex Poulter, The Circus Project, Ian Lawton, Hip Hop Circus Facilitators: Xavier Roeseler and Vicki McManus
BandBazi Youth Circus Theatre classes start again Sept 11th!
In the autumn we’ll be keeping Saturday classes going from 10-30am to 12pm at Hangleton Community Centre. We start back on Saturday 11th September and will spend the first half of term focussing on our skills - hip hop, aerial circus, acrobatics, bungee, poi spinning and juggling - as well as our drama and performance skills through drama games and improvisations.
It will be a 12 week term and will cost £60 for the term. Contact Ian for a booking form 01273 245584 or
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. If possible, please pay by direct payment - details will be on the booking form. If you pay by cheque, please post it to our office address as things handed to Philippa during class time often go missing!
If you know of anyone who would like to join the group, please give them our email address and tell them to get in touch.
Follow BandBazi on Twitter and join our Facebook group
You can get all the latest updates about BandBazi goings on by following us on Twitter http://twitter.com/bandbazi
Twitter, in case you don’t know is a micro-blogging site where you can put in short status updates, post links etc. It’s easiest to use if you install a little plug-in for your browser – like Echofon or Twitterbar for Firefox.
Or you can join our facebook group ‘Bandbazi Circus Theatre’. Just search for it or go to http://bit.ly/abF87C Please invite your friends!
