A Series Of Rhymes, Rills, Warbles, Mnemonics & Chanties

13:30 and repeats at 16:00, Friday 29th April 2016
Chapel – Level 2, King’s College London

No need to book just drop in!

A musical exploration of identity, history, cultural transmission and mythology with multi-modal artist Rob Sherman, recent Interactive-Writer-In-Residence at the British Library.

Rob’s spent his time at the British Library seconded to Lines In The Ice, an exhibition about polar exploration. This gave rise to On My Wife’s Back, an ongoing multimedia storyworld concerning the life of one Isaak Scinbank; explorer, diarist, sailor, avid angler and entirely fictional Victorian gentleman.

Scinbank’s story, and the story of those surrounding his life, is told in many different forms by On My Wife’s Back; including online videogames, handmade diaries, interactive maps and, particularly, song. Rob adapted, covered and wrote many traditional ballads, sea shanties, working songs and military marches during his time at the Library, using the form to develop the many themes of his work, explore song as a storytelling medium and comment on the tension between adaptation and original, as well as extending the narrative of Scinbank and his version of the 19th century in many unexpected ways.

In this half-hour set, Rob will perform some of these songs himself, both with and without accompaniment by traditional instruments, in the beautiful chapel of King’s College. He will also give a commentary on the fictive history and significance of each song, exploring how archival research, musical tradition and artistic license can combine to produce new, powerful works of art.

Image credit: Rob Sherman