Newton Abbot is set to turn itself into a fun venue for all the family on Saturday, July 25 (put it in your diary), when the inaugural Newton Abbot Festival swaggers into town.

It’s early days yet, but what’s already in store are, amongst other things, Newton Abbot in Bloom, a Court Leet Ale Tasting, poetry readings and a big exhibition about Darwin with street theatre, and a stage full of activities right at the town’s famed and face-lifted St Leonard’s Clock Tower.

There’s even ‘the Expression Zone’ (you know, for kids) possibly named after the look on all the youngsters’ faces after they’ve been dragged around the Darwin exhibition at Forde Hall. And with a graffiti wall, skateboarding, bmx-ing and djs, this is the Air Fusion-lite section of the day, now that the music festival has disappeared.

“Enjoy a FREE day of Devon at its best,” extols the website. “Why? Because a dedicated group of folk have put a lot of effort into this Festival day.”

And you’d better enjoy yourself, too!

posted by Cptn

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What a weekend for arts (starting Saturday, June 20). The contemporary dance troupe Task Force, led by Stephan Koplowitz, begin stepping their way around the historic South Devon with their Liquid Landscapes tour. Over on arts+culture there’s a run down of the venues, plus a diary of South Devon artist Helen Snell‘s involvement with the Mayflower Steps performance. But that’s not all

At the CCANW, Hadlon Forest there’s the Skylines Festival Day today (June 20). Check out arts+culture for more. And there are animated workshops as part of Exeter Festival and in association with Animated Exeter, tomorrow (Sunday, June 21). Check out D+CFilm for more.

Also on D+CFilm, there’s a Quails music video (by filmmaker Darren Jones) to celebrate the Teignmouth band’s Turkish Tour.

(and if you’re heading north – that’s North Devon, remember North Devon Festival’s Art Trek. Arts+Culture has some behind-the-scenes insights from Stella Levy as she organises the last few days up to the event).

posted by Cptn

(image: the Primitive Hut – part of Skylines at the CCANW)

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Plymouth Council leader Tory Vivian Pengelly has jumped to the defence of the BNP after leader of the Labour group on the council Tudor Evans was rude on his Twitter feed about BNP member Adrian Romilly.

For most people you couldn’t use strong enough language to condemn the fascist enemies of society, let alone British ideals, the BNP – but apparently for some in Plymouth Tudor Evan’s “derogotory insult” (as opposed to those glowing, up-beat insults we hear so much about), was too much to take.

According the thisisplymouth site, Vivien ‘had spoken to people who were “appalled” at the language used’ and has asked Plymouth City Council chief executive Barry Keel to launch an inquiry into the matter.

Tudor told the paper: “This was a comment I made on my personal web page.”

Maybe Tudor was getting confused with Rommel, or it could be the fascist policies that gave it way, but the object of the ire, BNP-man Romilly, wasn’t offended.

Read the full story

posted by Cptn

(Image: Viven Pengelly)

• Defending the BNP: naive or misguided? Comments please

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Devon Eccentric Colin Shaddick (no it’s official – he came third in this year’s competition), dropped us a poetic line to explain a bit about the origins of his award-winning eccentricity. You could get more of an insight at the Salon del Eccentrica, an Eccentric evening at the Broomhill Art Hotel, Barnstaple on Thursday, June 18 at 7.30pm.

Eccentric! Who, Me?

Maybe this is how it all started?

Imagined kazoo solo.
One hooded and very blue day
when I was at a most sensitive stage,
I was struggling
to wring some temperate words

from the chilly language

that shot to-and-fro,

above my rattling head.

I decided to try out

a few investigational expressions of my own.

I needed to make my mark:

draw a line in the sand.

I waited for a fleeting lull

in the daily hubbub

that continually clanged

from the pots and pans

in the steamy kitchen.

I made my entrance

and Mother turned towards me,

her arms now motionless

and her reddened elbows quivered

just above the popping soapsuds

and waited for the off.

I smiled, and determined to show off my verbal skills,

began my tirade…

They were not well-received words.

I was not allowed to continue with my experiment.

My father hurriedly interjected

and promised he would give me a thick ear…

in a minute.

I had no memory of him giving me anything, before.

I was totally flabbergasted

when he said he’d give me something -

and so speedily too.

I so wanted him to give me something.

I then pictured myself with one thick ear…

and decided it would look quite daft.

I told him that I thought it would look daft,

but he took no notice

and he up and gave me one anyway.

But it wasn’t within the minute!

No.

He said he’d give me one…

in a minute.

It took much longer than a minute.

By the time my thick ear arrived,

a good twenty minutes or so had passed!

Can incidents like the one I’ve just described above,

have a lasting affect on a person’s life?

Time moved on and I slipped inaudibly along with it…

Then, one day it happened –

I think I said something like,

Eccentric…Eccentric!

Who, me?

I’d never given much thought to eccentricity, really…

that is until they said I was eccentric.

They, were the British Broadcasting Corporation.

An eccentric was the last thing I’d contemplated being.

After all, as far as I was concerned

it wasn’t me who was heading in the wrong direction!

Vivid pictures then began to flow through my mind:

eccentrics as mad, frizzy-haired inventors,

or mumbling white-coated professors

ensconced in leaded-light, oak-panelled lodgings …

Stereotype images like that.

So, how did I get into this situation?
I vividly remember my dad treating me like an outsider,
but my mum often said she thought I was an artist

and that poetry was the most noble art.

So, when I left school and flew the uncomfortable nest,

I knuckled-down and made a new start.

I bought myself a Moleskine notebook… in black.

The sort that all the best poets

painters and composers are said to use.

It had an elastic band to hold it tightly shut…

(for when I wasn’t ready for the muse.)

With tried and tested equipment like that

how on earth could any decent publisher refuse?

But I’d get this recurring dream.
“Oh,” I’d be saying out loud.
“If I held the post of ‘Chair of Professor of Poetry’

at a famous old university,

I’d kiss goodbye to adversity.”

I’d be repeating this phrase over and over.

But, I’d be as happy as old Larry.

What a great way

to spend each and every busy-buzzing day.

I’d just tarry… there,

reading piles of good books, (and my guitar mags)

and every so often, quietly gaze down

from my dusty old window

at the pigeons pecking and puffing themselves up

on a perfectly manicured lawn,

in the quaint and quiet quadrangle.

I’d chat to the poetry students

in a fatherly-like way.

(They have scant knowledge

about anything in the real world,

you know.)

“This is the way poetry’s done,”

I would say to each one,

then show them a selection of

my very popular

self-published pamphlets.

They would probably pipe-up and say,

“Caw that’s brilliant, that is, sir.”

Then I’d rock back on my heels

and say to them: “Off you go then.

Order yourselves some copies from Mr Jenkins,

in the lovely old library downstairs,

and give ’em a good read.

But, no cheating though.

Make up some of your own stuff.”

They would then say,

“Oh, sir, pleeease!”

Then I’d relent and say:

“Well, go on then,

but change the words about a bit.”

I’d tap out my pipe on the pitted stone window ledge

and chuckle to myself, muttering quietly:

“Huh, bloody kids, who’d ’ave ’em?”

Then I’d sing a little song.
Who drew

the very thin line

between sanity and madness? (X3)

Who drew,
who… drew… it?

‘Aren’t all eccentrics bonkers, though,

and think of nothing other than their pet subjects,

and even if they attempted to repair the most simple of things

they’d turn out to be bodgings?

‘Their heads are in the clouds.’

That’s what people say.

Then again,

I do tend to engage my brain before my mouth

and some people have to wait ages

to get an answer.

Sometimes it can be as long as…

say, a goose would take

to complete its hazardous journey south.

I don’t always mean to be rude,

but you should understand

that I like a lot of solitude.

It’s not that I’m particularly shy,

it’s just because…that’s why.

‘An eccentric slice of a British way of life’,

that’s how I was described…

and all because I wrote Japanese-type verse

called haiku.

They thought it rather strange that I sometimes compose

when I’m riding on my baiku.

They wanted me on Radio 4.

I was to talk to Clare Balding about my poetic style,

and while I was explaining it, she would interject a bit.

It was something new for their programme, Ramblings.

Ramblings is a broadcast where everything depends

on supposedly interesting folk and their amblings.

That’s how the final die was cast.

Normality, for me, had breathed its last.

I was now officially ‘Eccentric’

and the BBC had nailed me to their mast.

Whatever happens in the future

as a result of this whirl of eccentricity…

will be secondary.

But that crowning moment

at the ‘Eccentric Club’ will always remain

with me and be the best,

because it’s where I got my title:

‘The Great British Eccentric 2009.’

I’d passed their test.

It now gives me the opportunity

to get so many dark secrets off my chest.
And did you know that…

If you say the word

kazoo, backwards,

it reads, oozak?

It then sounds more

like a question:

‘Oozak?’

That’s probably why

they never called

it that.

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If you’re looking for the creative offerings that Torbay and Devon has to offer, to quote the literature, pop along to Creative Torbay’s Arts Market and Creative Happening, which takes place today (Sunday June 14) at the Palace Avenue Gardens, Paignton.

The event is free, with 20 or so stalls selling jewellery, textiles, photography, glass and ceramics, with art from the Cheltson Gallery and the Torbay ArtsBase network.

There’s a make do and mend family textile workshop with Yvonne Temple and comical magical memories from Robin Fox. Plus stilt walking, music dance and a treasure trail.

Most of the stuff is free, but check.

posted by Cptn

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Our friends in the north (that’s North Devon) are up to all kinds of crazy art antics. Powerhouse of the North Devon arts scene Stella Levy, who’s organising this year’s Art Trek, June 19-21 and June 26-28, has started a blog over on artsculture.

“The last few days have been spent sending out invitations to VIPs for the Art Trek launch at Arlington Court, Carriage Museum, next Thursday (June 18),’ she says.

Find out if she can cajole anyone to make ‘dainty’ sandwich as the blog unfolds.

posted by Cptn

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Totnes, you know the constituency of everyone’s favourite mansion-owning MP, Anthony Steen, will be the setting a protest against the BNP’s Euro Election gains today (June 13).

There is no rise in the BNP, they have the same share of the bigoted and ignorant vote they have ever had.

Doesn’t mean we should ever be complacent in exposing and opposing the ‘BNP or any organisation which promotes racial, sexual orientation or religious intolerance’, as they say in the letter they want people to sign.

The problem is the rise of antipathy towards politicians – the active opting out and not voting that took place during the elections.

The Totnes MP was a big part of that pre-election atmosphere of political dislocation with his expenses claims, his offer to pay back 10 per cent and his assertion that the way he spent public money was nothing to do with anyone but him, what with us all being jealous of his lifestyle.

Sure, poor old Anthony Steen wasn’t the only MP caught out, and at least he wasn’t ‘flipping’ – the act of switching a nominated second home to maximise financial benefits. Steeny-boy was just chancing his arm when he supposed protecting his trees from rabbits in Totnes was fundamental in his representing the Totnes people in Parliament.

Totnes town councillor and former Totnes mayor David Horsburgh, told thisissouthdevon: “We must take a stand against the BNP and any form of racism.

“If not, we could sleepwalk into a Nazi-style state, as happened in Germany in the 1930s. We must take action, and take it now.”

We would add to ensure people are engaged in the political process, at least the letter they are sending to the ‘local press and media’ and all the councils will urge support of more affordable housing, improvements to schools, employment initiatives, ‘all of which reduce the climate that breeds ugly, divided communities and which give a security instead,’

Let’s wait and see what’s in store from the new Conservative-led county council on June 25 when they officially announce what they’ll be up to.

Meanwhile, the town council has a vacancy.

The protest takes place in the town between 10am and noon.

posted by Cptn

• We’re pulling together some questions for new Totnes Rural County Councillor Paula Black from the Green Party. If you’d like to join in, pop on over the People’s Republic of South Devon crowd sourcing site to offer your views.

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On a cool evening in a seaside town you can often do with a woolly jumper. Although that’s probably not what David Evans had in mind when he and his family saw a wallaby cavorting around a field in Teignmouth.

He told the BBC: “We went out and, sure enough, wandering around in a field until it got dark there was this wallaby.”

Years ago there were wallaby’s at the near by Holcombe, according to David.

But psst, the last picture is of some kind of wild cat, which are a more common sight hereabouts.

posted by Cptn

(image: a wallaby, not the wallaby)

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A few things over on D+CFilm have caught our eye this week, not least South West Screen’s notion that naming something after a Devon myth alienates people from up-country.

Exeter filmmaker Ashley Thorpe has funding for the latest in his Penny Dreadful series The Hairy Hands from the regional champion (that’s a reference to South West Screen, by the way), but they want to change the title to something, well, a little less Devon.

“I think they’re missing the point and the source of the appeal,” says writer, director and independent filmmaker of the year award winner, who’s recently had his films shown at Cannes, Ashley.

We say it sounds like the thin edge of the culturally homogenized wedge. Have your say over on D+CFilm.

Also on the site is a behind the scenes of the latest Ashley Wing film Robbing Peter, a darkly humorous tale from what we can gather (and a bit of a who’s who in the South Devon filmmaking scene).

Other stories include the announcement of a screenwriter talk at the Exeter Phoenix and a documentary filmmaking course as part of the Dartmoor Arts Summer School.

Got films or film stories, get in touch with D+CFilm on info@devon-cornwall-film.co.uk

posted by Cptn

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Any changes in energy efficiency and affordable housing levels at a development at Sherford, the planned new community between Plymouth and Brixton, has been condemned by South Hams Friends of the Earth.

South Hams Friends of the Earth (SHFoE) cites a letter from developers Redtree, which says: “It is inevitable that the affordable housing delivery at Sherford, like many other aspects of the planning agreement, will be reduced from the level presented to the committee in April 2008.”

(SHFoE) says the level of affordable housing has not yet been agreed between the developers and the council, but both are agreed that it will be cut from the 36 per cent approved in 2008 (itself a reduction on the 50 per cent contained within the council’s own policy: the Area Action Plan for Sherford)

And the energy efficiency programme has been moved back in time.

Spokesman for SHFoE Steve Melia told the PRSD: “We believe the council should stand firm. A delay would be better than environmentally damaging concessions.

“Any public subsidy for building during the recession should be concentrated on brownfield sites within the cities. Big greenfield developments like Sherford should be shelved until the market improves.”

The deadline for comments on the revised application to South Hams District Council is June 25.
posted by Cptn

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Are you talented Tenor? Dartington International Summer School is looked for one to be the dastard Pinkerton in Madam Buterfly.

The role is part of the summer school’s Advanced Opera course, which runs from August 15 to August 30. According to them it’s aninvaluable opportunity for singers on the threshold of their professional careers.

Plus there’s a 100% bursary available for this position, which includes all accommodation, food and course fees are included, plus access to concerts.

If you’re interested, you’ve got to at least prove you can carry a tune in a bucket and send a short recording and a CV to summerschool@dartington.org

posted by Cptn

For more arts stories, visit arts+culture

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The latest Lemanis album The Truth About a Push Me Pull You is set for a physical release on June 15, which means we need to make sure we publish the our review, so you know just what you’re getting into when you shuffle off to buy it from actual shops. For all you potential punters, a more authentic option would be to see them live at the Plymouth Hippo on Friday, June 12.

"As luck would have it," said Lemanis’ Phil, "we have a large line up gig this Friday at the Hippo.

"It’s set to be another fun one with support from Port Bandanas and Kat Marsh (that’s a good thing for those of you who don’t know). Music plus beer and all the fun intrinsically entwined within."

Or you can order the album from the Lemanis Myspace, or Amazon, or Genepool.

posted by Cptn

• Share your other ‘truths’ with us! Comment below

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