Festival of New Writing

I’ve lived in Cambridge for many years, surprisingly it’s taken this long to get involved with Cambridge University. Through a connection to Downing College the director of music introduced me to Stephen Bennett, director of drama who puts on a yearly event called the Festival of New Writing. 

In their own words

The theatrical jewel in the Downing Drama Society crown is its annual Festival of New Writing, established in 2014 and now a central and highly prestigious feature of the Cambridge drama scene. Every Lent Term, the Festival is produced and staged by students with the support and guidance of award-winning scriptwriter, director and theatre educator, Stephen Bennett, who helped initiate the event and continues to play an active part in its growth and development.

Students of all disciplines and from every Cambridge college submit one-act plays to be read and assessed over the Christmas holiday and from the wealth of admissions, nine are chosen to be performed over the three nights of the Festival (which also features live music and now includes workshops from professional writers and directors).

I was asked to work on the sound and music for two of the plays, a week of prepping and a week of rehearsals and performance at the Howard Theatre, wonderfully coincidental as it's named after Alan Howard who was my connection to the college (he ever so kindly let me stay in his apartment in Cannes during the film festival for years).

Whilst I'm sitting in the control room here's Steve Bennett introducing the plays …

And here's 'Noa', I created the sound for (using my iPad to trigger the sounds) in real time.