Laura Simms is an
award-winning storyteller, recording artist, teacher, writer and humanitarian
based in New York
City.
Remarkable
performances of traditional stories interwoven with personal narrative have
earned Laura Simms worldwide recognition and honors since 1968. Laura has
created an irresistible cutting-edge performance style that bridges ancient
oral tradition and performance art. Simms’ storytelling is meaningful and
uncannily entertaining for her international audiences. Her warmth, depth
of understanding, profound effect on listeners, diverse material, humor,
gorgeous voice and range of characterizations have achieved legendary
status.
Laura
performs stories for adults and family audiences. She brings her expertise to
collaborative projects worldwide, exploring social issues, peacemaking,
creativity and community dialogue. Her
work has varied from serving as artist-in-residence at universities to creating
original theater-dance works; co-designing a playground based on a fairytale to
working in conflict resolution and peace making with refugees. She is presently
working on a new training process and workbook of stories for those displaced
by natural disaster.
In
1979, Weston Woods Studio produced the first storytelling and music record featuring
Laura’s stories. She has gone on to record exquisite collections of
stories with music that have dazzled adults and children alike, including Women
and Wild Animals, Making Peace, The Gift of Dreams, Four-Legged Tales, Moon on
Fire, and others. (See list of titles.)
Laura
is a spokesperson for the healing properties and meaning of oral tradition at
theaters, festivals, schools, symposiums, corporate events, museums,
conferences and special events throughout the world. Most recently, she
has appeared in festivals in Romania, United Kingdom, Northern Ireland, Norway, Republic of China and Austria. She has been featured at A
Traveling Jewish Theater in San Francisco, New York’s Provincetown Theater and the
National Storytelling Festival in Jonesboro, Tennessee.
In
these times of increased insecurity and change, few storytellers worldwide have
engaged mythic storytelling for individual and community transformation with
Laura’s expansive vision. She has long been committed to spirituality, healing,
education, women’s issues, human rights and working with children. In 1999,
Laura won the Sesame Street Sunny Days Award for her contribution to children
of the world and has received many awards for her books, tapes and projects.
She is affiliated with The New York Shambhala Center, The Sterling Foundation,
the Center for Story at the Leonardo (Salt Lake City), and is a Fellow at the
Arthur Mauro Peace and Justice Center of the University of Manitoba. She is a
co-facilitator for the NEXT GENERATION project of the Murie Center for the Environment, Wy.
Laura
teaches ongoing storytelling workshops in storytelling as performance and as
social action, for story and healing, meditation, and individual
coaching. She has served three times as an artist-in-residence for the
Lincoln Center Institute and teaches at the University of Milwaukee, New York
University and The Naropa University. She directs the foremost Storytelling
Residency in the United States, now in its twenty-fifth year.
Recently Laura initiated a long-distance mentor program.
As a
writer and editor, Laura has written and served as contributing editor for Parabola
Magazine since 1996. After 9/11, she spearheaded the publication of Stories to Nourish the Hearts of
Children in a Time of Crisis (Holland & Knight), and, in fall of
2003, created A Key to the
Heart and Other Afghan Tales (Chocolate Sauce) to benefit children’s
education in Afghanistan. Her newest book, Becoming The
World (Mercy Corps, Inc.), has
served thousands of teachers worldwide in addressing issues of tolerance and
resilience. Her most recent adult title, The Robe of Love: Secret Instructions
for the Heart (Codhill Press), is a book of traditional love stories
published with rave reviews. (See list of titles.)
Laura
founded and directs the Gaindeh Project, an international initiative using storytelling, creativity, meditation and reconciliation for individuals and
communities. In her role as director of Gaindeh Projects, Laura worked in
Romania to teach storytelling skills to
orphans and gypsy mothers and directs a collaborative project, The Lion’s
Roar: A Community and Compassion Initiative. The Lion’s Roar works
to rebuild the Buhusi Zoo and, in turn, renew a devastated community in Moldavia. She is presently working with Search for Common Ground's Gillian Huebner in Washington, DC, on the LIFEFORCE PROJECT; and
she is the codirector for reunion with Mariatu Kumara (Canada's Child Ambassador for
UNICEF) of DISARMED FOR PEACE: The Reunion (4-pg pdf brochure) and Susan McClelland (producing the documenary). This reunion of
amputee child victims of the Sierra Leone Civil War will be held at the Sterling Foundation,
New York in the summer of 2008.
