Hannah Reade is a core-performer with Kings of England, a live-art-come-folkmusic-collective whose show I belong to this band has been developed during artist residencies at Greenroom in Manchester in 2011; and the BAC in London in 2010. In August last year Hannah organised 4 day long festival, The Living Room, which was a held in her home in Edinburgh. She has recently completed her Theatre studies at Dartington College of Arts where she performed with Pennyblack at postboxes around Devon, telling stories about letters. She is interested in the evolution of stories and recently wrote her dissertation on contemporary folk theatre. Her research was about conversation and collaboration with audiences in performance; these ideas sparked her project NightSongs which was a participatory singing project in which people were invited to write a song with her about a dream which they’ve had. Similarly with Free The Owls, this notion of folklore is explored on both a personal and universal level. She has worked as an assistant director with Prime Productions; a rehearsal assistant with Dog Star; and as a director with the Totnes Young People’s Theatre, and has interned at the Donmar theatre in London.
‘The Wandering Swallows’ were originally Verena Eidenberger and Hannah Reade. As they live in different countries, and sometimes continents, they decided to share this name with other creative partnerships either of them may have.
The Wandering Swallows Band consisted of Hannah Reade, Mairi McFadyen, Pete Rowan, Lewis Hutchison and Fiona Rutherford. There are links to their sites on the homepage.
