20 Stories High Presents CHOKKA, A Four-Part Audioplay By Luke Barnes

20 Stories High in association with unedited presents CHOKKA, a melodic, beat-infused story in 4 parts, written by Luke Barnes with 20SH Youth Theatre, directed by Nathan Powell.

Chokka is available now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Soundcloud.

Chokka follows 16-year-old Jem as they come to terms with the world around them, trying to fit in into a community in which they feel 'other', and discovering what happens when love punches them in the gut. With original beats, flowing melodies, mind and heart stretching poetry, 20 Stories High Youth Theatre each give their own voice to Jem, weaving in their own personal reflections on love, jealousy, depression, and friendship.

20 Stories High Youth Theatre - a group of 23 young people aged 14 to 21 living in Merseyside - had been creating a play with playwright Luke Barnes since October last year, due to be premiered at the Unity Theatre in July 2020. After the Covid-19 crisis prevented the staging of the show, the group explored and experimented with new ways of working remotely to create an audio series through a new creative partnership with audio company, unedited.

The group replaced their regular Tuesday in-person meetings with online sessions to connect with each other, to find new ways of being creative, and to develop a new approach of presenting their work. In addition, they worked with LAMDA, participating in skills-based workshops focusing on music, lyrics and poetry.

Luke Barnes: 'Theatre has traditionally been hung up on the idea of a principal artistic genius - be it director or writer - upon whom we've relied to dissect our world and put it on stage. But how can one person speak for us all, and represent lives of which they have no experience? In the coming years, it's vital we think of ourselves as enablers of conversation through Art, and that through theatre we enable communities to lead dialogue in the hope of moving forward as a society.

With this in mind, I feel privileged to work with 20 Stories High Youth Theatre. Not to capture a world and offer solutions, but to listen to what these exceptional young people wanted to talk about for the good of each other and their community, and make it into a piece of theatre - or, as events have turned out, a series of audio plays! I am impressed by the resilience and perseverance of the group in bringing to audiences the play we created together and look forward to sharing it.'

Rosie, Youth Theatre member: 'It's been fun and engaging to find ways to develop our play interactively even though we couldn't meet in person. Luke has created a thought-provoking storyline through a great collaborative process integrating pieces that we've written and we're proud that our voices can be heard in this way. I am excited that we've found a way to bring this play to audiences as an audio play, and it's been a real experience to learn about podcasts and see how amazing unedited make our performance sound!'

Nathan Powell, Associate Director of 20 Stories High: 'This is an extremely exciting journey for us to be going on as a Youth Theatre. It is a new way of working and an opportunity to make a piece that can reach far further than we originally imagined. Working with the young people and Luke has been a really special and collaborative process and we can't wait to share what we create.'

An accessible visual transcript and PDF version of the podcast will be available for audiences who require it (links available in the description of the podcast episodes).

To post a comment, you must register and login.