Listen to the soundscape of 'Shahre-Farang (Another Birth Remix)', a Stellar Quines commissioned artwork created by artist Mina Heydari-Waite in response to the play Sister Radio by Sara Shaarawi. 

The artwork is a sculpture and sound piece that features fragments of conversations, ideas and poems by people from the Iranian diaspora living in Scotland, recorded during workshops with community group Iranian Scottish. Their voices in Farsi and English explore personal and political histories in relation to the play’s themes of memory, rebellion and loss.

The Shahre-Farang (Another Birth Remix)sculpture is touring with the show in autumn 2022 so that audiences at each tour venue can experience it. We wanted the voices of people who have moved to the UK to be part of the conversation happening around Sister Radio and for those voices to be there in the theatres alongside the show. 

Mina’s sculpture takes its name from the ‘shahre-farang’ tradition of storytelling using a travelling peepshow box. ‘Shahre-farang’ boxes were popular in Iran during the 19th and 20th century and told tales from far off places. In our sculpture there was no peephole. Instead the stories are told through voices mingling with the sound of distant echoes of a warped taar string, the popping of esphand, Tehran’s city streets in the rain, the busy Raasht bazar and the inside of a shrine in Mashhad.

Shahre-Farang (Another Birth Remix) soundscape

In a world gone topsy turvy, it’s time to hear from the Quines. Join your hosts Hannah Lavery and Caitlin Skinner as they invite some of Scotland’s leading feminist writers, poets, playwrights and musicians to respond to the big questions that matter to women, non-binary people and people of other marginalised genders in Scotland today. Each episode has a theme to focus our thoughts around so come, coorie in and let’s put the world to rights.  
Brought to you by Stellar Quines, an intersectional feminist theatre company based in Scotland and created in association with the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh International Book Festival and Jupiter Artland.  

P.S. Quines, if you didn’t know is a Scottish word for women or girls.

Trailer

Who has ownership and freedom in our public city spaces? Does our relationship with the city change throughout our lives? What does a feminist city look like? 

Recorded in front of a live audience at the Edinburgh International Book Festival in August 2022, your hosts Hannah and Caitlin invite performances on the theme of city from folk singer Karine Polwart, crime novelist Denise Mina, journalist and author Chitra Ramaswamy and playwright Sara Shaarawi.

Quines Cast | CITY

Wild? I’m absolutely livid! How do we manage our anger at the destruction of the wild places that should provide us with solace? Will attitudes to the idea of a ‘wild woman’ always be negative? What happens if we lose ourselves in the wild?  

Recorded in front of a live audience at Jupiter Rising festival in August 2022, Hannah and Caitlin are joined by the butter voiced musician Kathryn Joseph, nature writer Dr Amanda Thomson, performance poet and community arts worker Victoria McNulty and featuring a short play written by queen of Scottish playwrighting Rona Munro.

Quines Cast | WILD

Sister Radio by Sara Shaarawi was a Stellar Quines co-production with Pitlochry Festival Theatre which toured in autumn 2022. It followed the story of two sisters from Iranian living together in a flat in Edinburgh for 43 years but never speaking to each other due to a past betrayal.

Following the tour, Iranian American writer Marjorie Lotfi created this sequence poem in response to the play, our SQ Engagement work and events happening in Iran.

Listen to Marjorie's beautiful performance of the poem.

Sister by Marjorie Lotfi

A snippet of the cast of The Fair Intellectual Club singing during rehearsals - turn volume to full. 

Find out more http://www.stellarquines.com/productions/the-fair-intellectual-club/

The Fair Intellectual Club Cast Singing

The Air that Carries the Weight 
A new play by Rebecca Sharp, layering reality and fantasy through immersive writing, design, lighting and original sound by Pippa Murphy. 

These are two examples of the evocative sound used in the piece.
Corrina Hewat - Harp
Pippa Murphy - Piano
Sandra MacKay - Gaelic Voice

www.stellarquines.com


The Air That Carries The Weight 02

The Air That Carries The Weight 01

Recording of Castle Chorus at St Mark's Unitarian Chapel Edinburgh.

Arranged by Pippa Murphy.

Choral recording for a new play The View from Castle Rock based on stories by Alice Munro. Adapted by Linda McLean

Presented by Edinburgh International Book Festival and Stellar Quines 11 - 29 August at artSpace@StMarks, 31 August - 3 September Scottish Borders

www.stellarquines.com

image: ©Bettman/CORBIS

Boat song

Psalm 107 SATB

Stellar Quines is an intersectional feminist theatre company based in Scotland. We create shows, support creatives and engage communities, all with the aim of achieving greater equality.

Stellar Quines

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