Jan Andrews (Canada)
Jan Andrews returns to Tasmania with delight. A Canadian teller, she has played a significant part in storytelling’s revival in her home country. As well as working on her own telling, performing at festivals and giving Master Classes for others, she has served as the Artistic Director of two series, organized complete tellings of epics such as The Iliad and The Odyssey, been the first coordinator of Storytellers of Canada-Conteurs du Canada and directed StorySave – a project for recording Canadian storytelling elders for audio website and CDs. Her first love is traditional material but she tells personal and literary stories as well. Using quiet strength, she strives to touch her audiences with performances of depth and power.

Jenni Cargill-Strong (NSW)
Jenni is the Director of the Storytree Company and storyteller with unbridled enthusiasm and passion for her art. Teachers often remark after a show, that students who seldom listen well, sit spellbound. Jenni employs a wide repertoire of dramatic skills and a beautiful singing voice to hold her audience. Her training includes a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature and Sociology from the University of Queensland, classical singing training and a diploma from the Drama Action Centre in Sydney. There she studied clowning, improvisation, dance, singing, mask, mummers, percussion and workshop facilitation specialising in storytelling. Her professional experience was gained in over twelve hundred schools in Australia and New Zealand. Jenni's first CD "Wonder Tales of Earth and Sea" claimed a special award from the National Library of Australia and she has now two new albums: "The Mermaid's Shoes" and "Stories to Light the Dark". She has performed for ABC national radio as well as ABC TV's '7.30 Report'. She has performed and presented workshops for the Bennelong Program at the Sydney Opera House, The Powerhouse Museum, the National Storytelling conference, the Woodford Folk Festival since 1993, Byron Bay Adult Community Education and The Byron Bay Writers Festival 2004.

Donna Jacobs Sife (NSW)
Donna Jacobs Sife is a writer, award-winning storyteller, educator and peace-worker. From the United Nations to Woodforderable international reputation is built on her capacity to bridd Folk Festival, her consige difference – be it within our societies, our communities or ourselves. For nearly two decades she has travelled widely throughout the world teaching and telling stories that speak to the perennial challenges of humanity.

Mary Kippenberger (New Zealand)
Mary was born in New Zealand but raised in Canada. She returned with family as a young, shy and very nerdy teenager! She spent 23 years as both a community and state social worker specialising in child protection. In the eighties shyness was put aside for an increasing involvement in theatre and storytelling. Now a fulltime professional storyteller, after dinner/conference speaker she divides her time between NZ, Australia and England. Mary has been a featured teller in five National Australian Storytelling Festivals as well as New Zealand’s ‘Glistening Waters’. Mary has four children and is a brand new grandmother. She lives on a pretend farm with her musician husband Peter Charlton-Jones.

Alexandra McCallum (Qld)
Alexandra McCallum is a storyteller, writer, theatre-maker, community cultural development worker and self confessed word addict. She has performed at the Queensland Art Gallery, State Library of Queensland, Brisbane Powerhouse, and facilitated workshops at numerous schools, libraries community centres and youth services. She balances a love of words with a passion for creating the silence in which a performer and audience can look into each others' eyes and step into a story together. 

Gail Robinson (QLD)
Gail Robinson has told stories all of her life… Born in an English village in 1953, that’s a lot of talking. She’s a beekeeper’s wife! A talent in itself and with family history tracking from Cornwall, Liverpool and Cockney London, there was a genetic certainty that she would be a storyteller! Working as a professional Storyteller and a community consultant, for over 20 years, each of Gail’s storytelling performances is a unique experience! Telling myth, folk-tales or her own stories…expect the unexpected… expect to laugh a lot …expect to be entranced!

Mary French (ACT)
Mary has come from a long line of storytellers.   Her father, London chartered accountant turned Tasmanian dairy farmer, used to hold his family spellbound around the Sunday dinner table as he recounted tales of his schooldays and of his Jewish clients (whom he highly respected) in the London rag trade. Her grandfather and great uncle were also wonderful storytellers. Mary was a good listener and spent much of her childhood absorbing their tales.   She has been telling stories herself since the early 1980’s and delights in entertaining listeners of all ages at every opportunity. She finds it most rewarding to enrich the lives of others by her stories and to encourage them to see the stories in their own lives and to develop their own sense of story.

Warren Reed (NSW)
Warren Reed was born and raised in Hobart, graduating from the University of Tasmania in the early 1970s, after which he studied in the Law Faculty of Tokyo University. He was later recruited into the Australian Secret Intelligence Service (ASIS) and after training in London with MI6, spent ten years as an intelligence officer in Asia and the Middle East. He has also been chief operating officer of the Committee for Economic Development of Australia (CEDA). Warren has long been interested in Tasmania's maritime history and will be talking about early links with Japan.

Gael Cresp (NSW)
Gael Cresp is a professional storyteller who tells a mix of traditional tales, modern stories she has written and heavily adapted versions of old, old stoies. It was while she was working on the Three Little Pigs that she saw the parallels with the life of her friend, jazz trumpeter Gil Askey and that is how her book The Biography of Gilbert Alexander Pig (Cygnet/Benchmark, 1999 & Puffin December 2001) was born. Her 2nd book Fish for Breakfast was published by Benchmark in early 2002. This publication of this collection of stories, pictures and reflections is part of her ongoing work exploring ways to rescue old stories and open their metaphors to all.

Jo Henwood (NSW)
Jo Henwood has been telling stories since the end of 1999, when she was trained in storytelling as an enhancement to her work as an historic house guide.  Immediately she fell in love with the magic of storytelling.  She joined the Australian Storytelling Guild (NSW), becoming an Accredited Storyteller in 2002, President in 2003 and Vice President last year. Jo particularly relishes stories of romance, mystery and loss, with all their emotional power.  She tells stories at folk festivals, historic houses, libraries and art galleries, mostly for adults.  She presented workshops on Storytelling in Museums at the 2005 National Storytelling Convention and the International Museum Theatre Alliance conference 2005.

Leticia Mattocks (Mexico + WA)
Leticia Mattocks, born in a small country town in Mexico, found herself surrounded by a rich cultural mixture of history, myths, stories, legends, beliefs, customs and ritual. She loves to weave all this into her stories including her original ones and has been telling them both in English and Spanish in Australia, California, Cuba, Peru and Mexico for the past twenty years, she is a member of the Storytelling Guilds in Mexico and Western Australia.

Gary Robert McKay (TAS)
Gary Robert McKay is a Tasmanian writer, educator and folk singer who developed story-telling skills as the parent of four children and a former drama teacher. He admires the work of American author Leila Berg and story tellers like Ronnie Corbett and Tony Robinson and what can be learned from traditional ballads. His approach is to interact with the audience to make the story fun and interesting but also believes that a story should not be "nothing", that it have some "improving" content.

Jenny Hill (WA)
Jenny Hill is a professional storyteller with extensive experience in performance and education. Her performances include The Odyssey, The Epic of Gilgamesh, Celtic, Russian and Middle Eastern Tales as well as contemporary ones. Jenny conducts workshops for both children and adults in the art of storytelling and is co-ordinator of The Storytelling Training Programme which commenced in May 2008. She is currently working with the healing power of story within the contexts of the elderly, chronic disease and substance abuse.

Shirley Way (Qld)
Shirley has been an active member & supporter of the Queensland Storytelling Guild for over ten years. She says: "As a child I would read for hours day & night. The power of wonder tales and archetypes in the fairy & folk tales spoke to me deeply, and taught me much about human nature. Today, speaking the tales is the means to extend the circle of torchlight, candle flame & hearth fire. The wonder of the tale enacted."

Matteo (VIC)
Matteo comes to storytelling from an arts and theatre background. After years of painting, designing, creating street theatre, large scale productions and youth theatre, he realized the possibility of bringing all these elements together without having to carry heavy props around. He has been story telling now for almost 20 years and has entertained thousands of people in numerous environments. He can be very funny.

Max Strong (NSW)
Max Strong is a prize-winning writer and performer of both contemporary and bush poetry.
He taught English as a high school teacher and worked as a specialist teacher with students with learning difficulties for thirty years. Max has developed many programs to engage students with literature and has organised poetry and literary events to inspire students. When Max became a father and his young children asked him for stories, 'Salty Pete's Troo Adventures' began pouring out if him spontaneously. Max becomes so salty when he tells these tales peppered with nautical terms and history, some suspect he may be tapping into a past life!