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72 Educators providing Teacher courses in Corsham

Characters Stage School

characters stage school

Bradford On Avon

Characters was set up in November 2010 by Moira Townsend Williams to provide opportunities for children and young people to obtain a performance arts training with a creative ethos. Moira is a producer and writer living in Bradford on Avon, who has also been a professional actor, (trained at Guildford School of Acting) as well as a casting director and theatrical agent. Besides producing shows for Characters, she has produced 15 live shows of her own show The Casting Couch in London’s West End and a TV pilot for Channel 4, and various other film and theatre projects including the launch for Salisbury based Women’s Theatre JUNO. Characters employs teachers and directors who are also working in the industry so that the experience your child receives is always relevant and up-to-date. Current members of the team include Maria Finlay, who has many London acting credits, who teaches and directs our Saturday Stage School at The Arc as well as Little Characters, and Trinity Exam groups, Emma Tierney who teaches/directs our Bath Characters classes, and Megan Ashton who runs our Little Characters group. Past teachers and directors have included Leanne Copley, choreographer and performance arts teacher from St Brendan’s Sixth Form College who headed up the recent partnership with St Brendan's Performance Arts Academy, as well as Tillie Bolton who now runs her own Theatre School TSPA in Bristol. Our Stage Company, which devises new plays for performance, was in 2017 led by award-winning Bristol director Dave Lovatt and Musical Director Helen Temmink. Past workshops have been led by many well known industry professionals including Penelope Wildgoose, a Stroud based award-winning actor/director, David Bond, head of performance at Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, Sophie Jacobs-Wyburn, who now runs The egg youth theatre in Bath,David Lane, a leading Bristol based director and dramaturge, and Tom Wainwright, who was recently writer in residence at Bristol Old Vic. The vision of Characters is to provide a training that as closely as possible emulates a drama school training, adapted for the various age groups. This not only gives participants a solid foundation in techniques and skills, should they wish to pursue a career in performance arts later on in life, but also develops team building, confidence and self-esteem which are all key to a child’s personal development and happiness – whatever they do in life. Because we are not a franchise, we can keep our fees affordable, and we will always work with parents to swop skills for fees so that our classes are accessible to all.

Spirit of the Inca

spirit of the inca

Radstock

Lying flat on my back for 16 days back in 1980 something, I was in so much physical pain that I could not move. It was then that I began to realise that I needed to change my life! I had been literally 'floored'! Stopped in my tracks. I had nowhere to run, or hide. "It wasn't by chance that during that time I came across a reflexologist who helped me to see that this was a turning point in my life. As a result of that meeting, and the healing that followed, I trained to become a reflexologist. My healers journey had begun and everything changed. "Over the course of the next few years, I noticed that some clients healed and others did not. My curiosity and desire to be of service led me to explore all kinds of therapeutic processes... counselling, gestalt, person centred therapy, psychosythesis. It was a great help in understanding how the mind affected the body. And I noticed that now I was able to help more people to heal.. and yet I noticed that still some clients did not. "My wondering about this led me fully into the healing arts and I began to understand that we each have a soul's journey. I had to ask myself: 'Why am I here?' 'What am I meant to be doing with my life?' "At the level of the soul I needed to know that my life has meaning and purpose beyond the everyday, and I learned that creative expression is vital to my wellbeing, as is finding a meaning and purpose that fits who I am. During this time I had many teachers. I trained to be a yoga teacher, I discovered 5 Rythms dance, and explored ways to use my voice... each time reaching out beyond my comfort zone, beyond who I thought I was.. to discover aspects of me that had been hidden or surpressed in the simple act of living this everyday reality. "My wondering led me to run a women's group for ten years. I wanted to explore what it means to be a woman in today's world. Together, we explored the sacred feminine, the goddess, the myths that we live by, we explored sacred landscapes, ceremony and ritual and found ways to connect with Mother Earth, a connection lost in working world today. During those years I took groups on Outward Bound courses in the landscape of Dartmoor. It was as much my journey as it was for those who shared it with me. We all learned a lot about ourselves, about what we were truly capable of. Incredible transformations took place in us all. Above all I learned the resilience of the human spirit, how stepping beyond fear creates inner trust and confidence... and that when we truly face our fears and embrace them we liberate ourselves then our presence liberates others. "Finally my journey led me to Shamanic Training. I have worked with a number of shaman in my life, and now, Incorporating the processes and techniques that I have learned both from the Inca tradition and many other great teachers along the way, I have developed a training which is powerful, beautiful and for me is the final piece in the puzzle. "Working at the level of energy affects all of the bodies: the soul's journey, the mental body, the emotional body and the physical body. I have also learned on this journey that it is a sacred journey, a journey towards wholeness... and the more I heal of myself, the more I affect those around me in a positive, life enriching way. "This is the work that I do in the world, it's the gift that I bring. "My medicine stones form a powerful healing tool called a Mesa. "My Mesa contains the wisdom that comes from my personal healing, the transformation of old worn-out stories of powerlessness, turned into power; of pain and suffering turned into compassion; and ancient wisdom handed down through the ages, through a lineage of medicine men and women whose grace, dignity and childlike innocence reminds me of what we have lost in the Western world. "And now I teach others how to build theirs."