Don’t Scare the Nightingale

All the birds of the forest got wonderful colours. Red, yellow, green, blue. All except one. The Nightingale arrived last. And so it got whatever was left: a bit of grey, a bit of ash. The other birds looked at it, laughed at it and decided that such a colourless bird had no place in their forest. And they wanted to chase it away. Ringleader and troublemaker: the Magpie. That, more or less, is how a comic fairy tale begins, about a little bird that ended up alone because it was different. But the Nightingale has no intention of apologising for the colour of its feathers.

When a fire throws the forest into turmoil and the little partridge chicks are left alone in their nest, a new danger appears: a hungry and extremely ambitious Fox who wants to conquer the world of opera. Heaven help her. But before that, the greedy guts has to fill her belly, and she wants to eat the partridge chicks.

That is when the one they had all chased away comes back.

And it has brought its own weapon: its voice. With a song, it manages to confuse the Fox so much that she forgets all about the partridge chicks and starts dreaming of a career… in Hollywood.

Through comic twists, original music, songs, puppets, shadows and the children’s active participation, ‘The Nightingale’ talks to young children about something they know very well from their own everyday lives: what happens when a group of friends decides that someone ‘isn’t like us’. Being different, exclusion, bullying, friendship and respect find their way into the story without preaching and without ready-made slogans. The children laugh, join in, take a stand and watch the birds of the forest discover that the one they used to make fun of had something none of them had.

Because in the end, the most ‘colourless’ bird in the forest had the most remarkable voice.

Organised performances for schools.
The performance can also be staged at your school.
Information – Bookings: 210 8656004

The performance is also available to schools as a live stream.