Oral Histories : Ali Williams, Blaze Tarsha, Toby Philpott, Ben Hyde, Tim Adam, Annette Loose

A UNIQUE circus troupe with a flying saucer-shaped tent has chosen Llanellis North Dock as the launch pad for its European tour.




Oral History Recordings have been a major focus of the last few weeks. Here is just a few snippets:

What does Ali believe is the key to the success of NoFit State? Who entered a unicycle race in a pink tutu and Afro bunches? Find out how 2000 miles of free petrol helped give birth to a State and where a mixed crowd suddenly meant more than a 'load of Punks, Hippies and Yuppies'. Who has 'good ears', who had got a fright in a hoody and where was the sword fight. Read on to find out.

Ali Williams interviewed by Paddy

"I'm just curious to know to what you owe NoFit State's longevity, it's notoriously difficult to hold any company together  to survive was long as NoFit State has?" (Paddy)

"I put that down to passions of the individuals that have been involved and the shear determination

Ali interviewed by Sophie and Paddy

but also I would say that our growth has been to do with the fact that when we first started we made a pact … because we started  with nothing we were just unemployed students on the dole so anything we got was better than nothing

so we made a pact to say if we don't get better at what we do each year then we give up,

so all the way through the company history we've been enabling ourselves to take big risks because we had that mentality of like, okay, well if it fails we'll just be back on the dole

and we managed to carry that with us for quite a way through our history until the point when more people started to rely on us, so as the company's expanded it's become harder to take those sort of risks,

but the reason the company's expanded in that way is 'cause we've been recognised for doing what we do really well

and therefore we've become a bit more secure with our funding and financial arrangements so we have to take less risks than we did when we first started

but in the beginning we took some ridiculously enormous risks to enable us to take the company forward, for example, you know, when we did ImMortal the first time we lost £40,000 on that tour

which we covered by doing workshops up the Valleys and everything else that we do to fill the gaps so that we could pay the performers and not go bankrupt but basically if we'd gone bankrupt we'd have gone, well we tried it and we failed,

the second year we did it we lost 20,000 it was like, well, that was twice as good as last year!

third year we broke even

fourth time we made 60 grand, so actually being allowed to take those risks enabled us to develop and without taking those risks, or we wouldn't have moved forward if we hadn't been in that, sort of,
we're happy to take risks,

the number of times Tom and I have said to each other 'do or die' you could count on twenty hands over the time we've been here and that's the key to the success of this company."

Toby juggling five rings

Blaze Tarsha interviewed by Paddy

Blaze Tarsha interviewed by Paddy Faulkner

"My very first encounter with the circus and with NoFit State was the Juggling Convention which I imagine I was about 12 years old, um, my mum was cooking she was good friends with Liz who lived in our town which was Bath and my mum got asked to come and cook for the jugglers,

so during that time I had a lot of spare time and wasn't quite sure what to do with myself and I came across the unicycle which was something I didn't know how to ride but I was very curious about it and for the rest of that week I spent in a football kind of cage because it was really good to use the wire wall to help me like learn, 

so every day I was in there determined to ride this unicycle and eventually by the end of the week I was riding free hand so I was very happy about that but then I think I got slightly carried away and decided to enter the unicycle race which was very funny, I think I had on a pink tutu and big bunches I had like quite a big afro at that point and I remember starting and probably not making it far at all but I was really happy just to be there with everyone with my unicycle."

Toby Philpott interviewed by Sophie and Jo

"Things brought me to Cardiff and I had spare time and I set up a little juggling class just to share that skill with people,

and the first week nobody came, and the second week 1 person came and said I know lots of people who'd  love to do this and then the third week 20 people came, including the five founder members of the circus

but also a group of other people, um, I was charging to pay for the rented room and make myself a little bit of money,

but they were all fairly poor students and squatters and punks and all sorts of people, so they said we can't really afford to pay for this

and I said so long as the hall's paid for I don't mind,

and they had a bright idea which was to set up a juggling club at the University and the University would pay me as a tutor,

Toby interviewed by Jo and Sophie

they would be given the great hall to work in, they would be given some money to buy stuff like unicycles and things,

and they would even be lent a Mercedes bus and given 2000 miles worth of petrol or something, there was something about University clubs that got these resources, and

it meant that I was paid, which was great, and that they had the resources."

Ben Hyde interviewed by Sophie

"I come from a background of small community circus where theres a lot of volunteer led things,

Ben Hyde interviewed by Sophie

theres a lot of scraping together props and a putting together a little show if you can make it,

and so the scale of stuff here is just huge,

having professional directors,

huge performance space with so many pieces of the equipment that I've never seen before,

never realised existed,

didn't realise it was actually accessible,

and the sense of family here its huge, I never realised how big NoFit State was until I started doing the teacher training a couple of years ago,

and even then every time I come back and do a sort of  six month stint there's people here that I didn't realise were part of the family,
it just gets bigger and bigger and bigger, um,

The hoodie in question

in fact the moment for me was when I was wearing a

hoody in London one time,

just in a bar,

some random person just ran up to me and went

'Oh my gosh, you're part of NoFit State!

I'm just wearing the T-shirt actually but thanks' !

The scale of NoFit State has a huge reputation that precedes it wherever it goes.

I noticed it's taken very seriously, um,  as an art form, as a performing arts company as a touring company

it's a big professional lovely cuddly company"

Tim Adam interviewed by Catrin and Kay

One of our favourite gigs was Castlemilk which is an outlying estate in Glasgow, eh,

Castlemilk estate

we had to have two rows of fencing around our circus compound because they were worried, you know, what would happen,

the local arts officer had a gun drawn on him while we were there,

two men were arrested  for fighting on the street with swords,

and the people of Castlemilk loved us,

with such warmth,

and it just felt really rewarding that we could go there and at least add a little bit of happiness to..,
although as one mum put it we were cheaper than a babysitter! It was about 50p to come and see the show!

And equally, probably in the same year, we went to Belfast in the height of the Troubles

Tim Adam interviewed by Catrin and Kay

we were very naive, I think that's why we went,  all the rest of the arts organisations in the UK were not going there,

so just the fact we went there we were open, you know,

we had to turn so many people away,

and it was a totally mixed crowd and like the first time I'd ever came across the idea the fact it was mixed because it was both Protestant and Catholic,

I thought it was mixed because there were punks and hippies and yuppies and everything, you know,

the taxi driver pointed out to me they were mixed because different  religions, I hadn't bothered asking, you know

so yeah, when we were so small and like we were still being received with such warmth that was great, and nowadays we are a lot bigger but people still,  tres genial, that's what a lot of French people describe us as."

Annette Loose interviewed by Dance Hayday

"…whether we could meet up for an interview sort of thing, so I drove from London to Bath, and I met Tom and Chris Pink at that point 'cause he was kind of the sound designer put the system in as well,

and met them in a tiny little cafe in Bath, and eh, yeah just  chatting away and wotnot, and then I said to Tom, I remember saying to Tom I would like to see the tent as well just to get an idea,

I'd never worked for a circus."

'you'd never worked for the circus before then' DH

"I didn't know the Blue tent, I didn't know Psycircus, you know, I'd not been involved in the community projects or anything, you know, I was based in London.

so anyway, my little Fiat Panda, driving behind Tom in this big land rover, ' not so fast!'






so we got to, where was it, Pontypridd, that's right, and the tent was already up, because it was just before rehearsals started and I saw the tent and that was it, totally fell in love with it,

 I didn't tell Tom,  thought I'd let them know a bit later because I wanted to negotiate a little bit with them,

the following day I said to Tom if you want me you have to get me a caravan and he said 'done deal', so he got a lovely little caravan,

and within three days I'd packed all my you know stuff  in London away did redirect address and joined the circus."

'And that was it, you were within NOFit State' DH
yep
'and your role at that time was' DH
"sound engineer"
'sound engineer' DH
 "yep"

'I understand maybe now you do more involvement with the actual production in making music yourself, you play instruments do you yourself?' DH

"Yeah I mean, ah, 2004 I joined as sound engineer and then I didn't do 2005 for various reasons, then 2006 Peter Reynolds, who was then the musical director, he'd asked me to asked me to join the band

basically, he learned that I played saxophone and stuff, and um, on tour we used to sometimes just jam together, and I think out of that came his, you know, asking me would you like to to audition and join the band, and in the end I ended up in the band,

also the sound engineer who Tom and I had introduced to NoFit because I didn't do 2005, so Dylan did 2005 so he covered for sound, and Dylan also then ended up in the band,

so Dylan and me both ended up in the band, so then they were trying to find a sound engineer again

'Oh wonderful, so its given you quite a lot of transferrable skills then moving within the one company' DH

"Yeah, apparently I've got very good ears! And love for music and all that!"