The National
Rural Touring Forum (NRTF) is one of those wonderful under the radar
organisations that helps keep rural Britain thriving. I’m its Chair.
My journey
to that heady position began when I became what is known in the rural touring
world as a “promoter” eight years ago. That is, a volunteer who makes a
professional performance happen in their village hall. There are currently
1,659 of us across rural England, Wales and Scotland. And last year, we put on shows
to over 330,000 paying audience members – a whopping 26% increase over the last
ten years.
My village
of Castle Carrock has about 270 inhabitants and it’s located 10 miles east of
Carlisle, on the edge of the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
We still have a good pub, a thriving school, a church and crucially, a village
hall, The Watson Institute. Hosting rural touring shows has been a crucial
mechanism to keep the hall busy and talked about.
My hall.
It’s a very special place and means the world to me. Built in 1897 by the
richest family in the village originally as a Reading Room, it’s now a
wonderfully intimate village hall and venue where I can sit 65 people at a
push, cabaret style, small tables, candles, subdued lighting and a small stage
that I borrow from the school next door.
There are
two seasons to the rural touring year where I live in Cumbria – the spring season
and the autumn season. A small organisation called Highlights acts as the
clearing house for me as I choose which shows to put on. Highlights is a
charity, one of twenty seven such schemes across the UK.
The schemes
get some of their money from the Arts Council, some from the box office and
some – though less and less – from local authorities. It means that they can
help subsidise more “risky” shows, encouraging more confident promoters to try
out shows that might on paper be more difficult to sell. And the schemes are
affiliated to the NRTF which advocates for rural touring as well as helping to
drive a central strategy. A recent three year campaign to get professional
dance into village halls – yes, dance into village halls – has been a huge
success.
Tom Speight
January 2018
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