Western Chronicle
Once this land was lush and green
With Crystal Waters, Cold and clean
The wind would whisper through the trees
“There’s Plenty for you, plenty for me”
One Trunk Theatre Presents…
Western Chronicle
a Western musical adventure written by Heitha Forysth (Sol James)
Created by Ethan Radstrom and Andraea Sartison
Western Chronicle is a horse-and-rider show integrating western riding techniques with music and dance. The emerging story explores individualism, conquest, and destructive selfishness, set in a future west of water shortages on the dried-up prairies.
About the Show
“I have been developing A Western Chronicle with Ethan over the last two years - in conversations, writing, and initial workshops with actors, dancers, choreographer, professional riders, and horses. A poet and storyteller, Ethan learned the farrier trade working three years with Cirque du Soleil. Now with 20 years experience, he approached me to help tell a story using horses not just as spectacle but as an integral part of a story to be told for rural audiences, people he works with everyday all over Manitoba.”
- Andraea
Artistic Team
Written by Heitha Forsyth
Created by Ethan Radstrom and Andraea Sartiston
Videography by BNB Studios and Patrick Jordan
Edited by Patrick Jordan
Performers:
Heitha Forsyth as the Balladeer
Emily Solstice-Tait as Sarala
Jozetta Stych as Hazel Corpus
Also Featuring:
Rayna Dawn
Kara Joseph
Jean Van Der Merwe
Choreographer: Tanja Faylene Woloshen
Fight Choreographer: Jacqueline Loewen
Production Coordinator: Daphne Finlayson
Special Thanks to:
Joshua Banman, Gimli Septic Services, and Tannis Walc.
MEET THE TEAM
Heitha Forsyth (Sol James)
Winnipeg-based Sol James is a force to be reckoned with, with a voice to match. A unique take on roots/blues with a soulful flair, her music is joyful and honest, leaving audiences smiling, dancing, and celebrating the great stuff of life. Sol’s stage presence calls out to even the meekest of souls, breaking down walls and bringing the light in. She does this with a dependable dose of hilarity; You can hear a Sol James audience laughing a mile away.
Sol’s relatability, training, and demeanor make her an excellent teacher. A graduate of the University of Manitoba Jazz Program, she can be found teaching vocal and jazz lessons at the Manitoba Conservatory of Music and Art, and at University of Manitoba Jazz Camp. She can also be found sharing art, expression and joy in hospital environments as a performer with Artists in Health Care. She also has completed her Music Therapy degree and training in 2019, serving populations across Winnipeg.
Emily Solstice-Tait
Emily Solstice Tait is of mixed settler and Ojibway heritage, living in Treaty 1 Territory, Winnipeg, Manitoba whose works floats between fantasy and advocacy. She is a 2019 graduate of the Professional Program at the School of Contemporary Dancers and a multidisciplinary artist with her practice crossing into theatre, devising, choreography, and stage management. Past projects include performing with Odette Heyn-Projects/ Indian City & Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, WCD’s Actualize (Ming Hon) and Calibrations of Flux (Jolene Bailie), Théâtre Cercle Molière Marathon De Crèation (Miguel Fortier), Stephanie Ballard and Dancers, Sarasvati Productions, Theatre New Brunswick/ Confederation Centre for the Arts (PEI), Raven Spirit Dance & Vines Art Festival (Vancouver), Rouge-gorge/ New Dance Horizons (Regina), New Blue Emerging Dance (Toronto), and in Creando Lazos a Través de la Danza (Léon & Guanajuato, México).
Jozetta Stych
Jozetta Stych is a singer, producer, writer, actress, filmmaker, artist, and Winnipeg's doyen of the sitar. Playing the guitar, bass, rubab, dobro vina, sitar, drums, and tabla, Jozetta has collaborated with many prominent artists including Talia Pura, Deep Singh, Jagjeet "Jug" Sroay, Devindra Pooran, Nandkishore & Sharmela, Monika Wall, Sudhir Narain, and late Calgary legend Ozi Chaput as well as groups like Manohar Performing Arts of Canada, the Dog & Pony Show, MUST, Querkus, Skingerbread Man, Half Man Half Elf, Sugarcane, the Hummers, ZBU BUS, the Drovers, and Metal Joy in the course of thirty-five years in music. Stych has released several albums from "Springtime" (1991) and "The Change" (1993) through "Sins and Dreams" (1999) and "Poor Andy's Dog & Pony Show" (2007), scoring or performing in films like Guy Maddin's "The Saddest Music in the World", Shannon Ottarson's "The Keys", and the "Poor Andy" series which she wrote and directed. Jozetta is known as much for her fiery personality as her ferocious intellect and flamboyant style, but it is perhaps her visual art that has garnered the widest attention. From her umpteen Ragpickers posters, album covers for Winnipeg luminaries like The Magnificent 7s and Smoky Tiger, blockbuster graphics for the Winnipeg Roller Derby League, and stunning scenic animations for Manohar's epic "Sunset Moonrise" (2016) through her many illustrations for Heartland Associates, Inc. and Canada's History Magazine including astonishing portraits like that of Métis legend Louis Riel (2019), Ms. Stych's work has become almost a feature of the Manitoba landscape.
Tanja Faylene Woloshen
Tanja is a contemporary dance artist and educator, whose work investigates the earth and cosmos of the somatic imagination. Selected choreographic works include “Holy Wild”, “A Quantum State”, and “Encounters Of The Man Kind”. Her choreography for Theatre Projects Manitoba’s “A Short History of Crazy Bone”, received a Winnipeg Theatre Award Outstanding Choreography Nomination. Conference presentations include The Canadian Network for Arts & Learning, Dance Studies International, and the International Expressive Arts Therapy Association.
Her current research for performance is focused on posthuman wilderness. Also, as “The Happy Phantoms Collective” (founded in 2019 by Mia S. van Leeuwen, Ming Hon, Natasha Torres-Garner & Tanja Faylene Woloshen), she is contemplating the difficulty and beauty of death, and what is haunting.
www.tanjafaylenewoloshen.org
Jacquie Loewen
Jacqueline Loewen is a theatre maker, and founding member of the multiple Canadian Comedy Award nominated physical sketch group Hot Thespian Action. She has worked extensively as a fight choreographer and movement coach on every professional stage in Winnipeg, as well as at Bard on the Beach (VAN) Can Stage (TO), and Kansas State University (KS), and has won two Winnipeg Theatre Awards for outstanding choreography. She has adapted and directed site specific operas for Manitoba Underground Opera, Little Opera Company, and Flipside Opera, and created several experimental physical theatre pieces, notably La Belle Laide (nominated for Harry S. Rintoul award), and Tree in the Closest Distance (residency at The Sawdust Collector, Vancouver).
Ethan Radstrom
Ethan Radstrom is a farrier by day and a multi-medium storyteller by night.
He came by his career in the horse industry almost by accident. In 1995, poor circumstances forced him to take a job mucking stalls and walking racehorses at Hastings Park in Vancouver. Since then he’s toured throughout the US and Canada with two acclaimed equine circus productions, attended blacksmithing school in Belgium, and established his own farrier business in southern Manitoba. In 2016, he began Prairie Hammer Metalworks, a new endeavour which brings together traditional blacksmithing with modern metalworking techniques.
Ethan’s written words can be seen in such publications as rip/torn, and he has recently completed his first novel, In The Stables.
A touring show on horseback.
Sarala Naja can divine water, Hazel Corpus has the power to heal. Will they use their powers for good or evil when the rivers run dry and the tooth and nail fighting of the good old days takes place in a Wild West future? A rodeo may be the only way to keep them above snakes and determine who walks out into the sunset. A Western Chronicle showcases the best of Western riding in our province together with the a team of ace-high physical performers and a live country band, getting down in the dirt of a horse arena.
Artist and farrier Ethan Radstrom approached Andraea Sartison in 2018 about a collaboration. This production is the result of a multi-year collaborative investigation- perhaps the company’s most unique to date. A Western Chronicle is a rodeo spectacular that unites his two worlds of horsemanship and the arts- worlds that share a similar language, the difference being only a matter of vocabulary.
Photo of Andraea Sartison, Emily Solstice, Ethan Radstrom, Daina Leitold, Tanja Wolshen & the trainers of Thunder Spirit Ranch
