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 IN FESTIVE MOOD
Apart from single-mindedness, determination, diplomacy, tact, hippo-thick skin and
organisational abilities that Nato might find useful, what else would your ideal festival
organiser require to withstand the many slings and torments that go with the territory
when it comes to mounting one of London’s most successful community festivals?
Talking to Kay Trainor about her work over the last seven years as the Stoke Newington
festival director, it occurred to me that blind faith and a near lunatic optimism might
also be part of the job spec. Why else, after all, would you knowingly take on the near
impossible task of trying to mount a three week arts festival - designed to appeal to
everyone - in one of the most diverse and contrarian communities in the country? Whatever
the festival organisers do, it sometimes seems, exception will be taken and criticism
forcefully expressed - but while the lslington festival bites the dust, Stoke Newington
goes from strength to strength. With only two months to go before this years extravaganza,
and after seven years in the job, Kay closely resembles a normal human being calm, unfazed
and full focused on the - job in hand, juggling budgets, fund-raising, event planning and
liaising with more local government departments than you can shake a stick at.
She talks of melting cacti, misplaced power lines and absentee stages, of her hopes for
an awesome all-day skateboarding festival in the park this summer, with breakdancers, film
makers, hidden microphones and musicians - if the proper funding can be found (benefactors
please note). And she talks most of all about the festival team’s hopes for a truly
inclusive festival -run by and for the people in the area. There are plans - again
dependent on funding - to commission a festival census, to look at who’s involved,
who stays away, and why. For Kay and her team - Paul West who handles marketing, Fiona
Fieber, the programme producer, fund-raiser Julia Payne, project manager Fiona Peek and a
constellation of specialists, technical advisers and the all-important volunteers - there
are constant battles to raise money, despite the generous and committed support the
festival has received over the years from local businesses and the council. The lists - of
projects and problems, adjustments, compromises, last-minute panics and plans - are
endless and exhausting. So how on earth did she allow herself to be drawn into this
madness?
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A Mancunian, she first came to Stoke Newington - like so many others, quite
accidentally, ‘by happenstance’ - in 1982, after reading English and Politics at
York University, a stint in France teaching English, some amateur theatre work and a
burgeoning career as a script writer for film, tv and radio.
Her two children, Sam and Lone, are Stokie born and bred - and partly responsible for
their mother’s present position, as Kay got involved in organising school events.
Probably as good a training ground as any. One year after the festival first started, she
attended a public meeting about the event and the rest is hectic history. Kay admits that
the festival takes a toll - in terms of time, especially - but her involvement and her
commitment are undiminished.
After the triumph of Parklight last year, she’s determined that this year’s
festival will be bigger and better, with more educational projects and, if anything, an
even more ambitious programme. The team are still battling against time to raise the money
required to offer as varied a programme as possible - the event isn’t a
money-spinner, despite its success - but everyone involved, and Kay in particular, is
convinced that the festival can continue to develop organically, as it has in the past -
to deepen rather than expand, drawing more and more members of the community into the
process and offering something for everyone. Without local support, she stresses, the
festival wouldn’t exist. It isn’t an easy task - but for Kay it has been the
highlight of her professional life.
The doubting Thomases can go elsewhere. The rest of us should be proud of it - and make
as much of it as we can. Perhaps one day, soon, it will be so successful that, like
Edinburgh, it’ll have its very own Fringe? Then we’ll know it’s here to
stay |
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