The Crane Bag Podcast: Recent Episodes
Jay Leeming
Myths and stories from around the world brought alive and singing into the here and now by storyteller, musician and poet Jay leeming.
Does science kill what it loves? Does the biologist ask the sparrow's permission before placing a microchip on its shoulder? What world is this we live in?
Considering Christopher Nolan's film version of the Odyssey and its place in the life of this story.
I remember the temple beside the sea like teeth worn down by wind and rain, the sea far off and in close as the sea is always, near and far coming together in the salt-white crush of the moment. Then back on the bus, back to Athens, back to the bus stop with its orange pillars and across the busy street of cars and garbage a statue of Prometheus, haloed by all the letters of the alphabet: his gift.
The thing is the dark and the going down, the not knowing, but he's a fella who wants to know and so that is the reason and the way. Some book you can read only with your eyes closed, maybe, some song you can hear only in total silence.
Poet and storyteller Jay Leeming explores the poem "After a Death" by the Swedish poet Tomas Transtromer.
www.JayLeeming.com
The poem "At Melville's Tomb" by Hart Crane, read and explored by poet and storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The story is not the words - the story as dialogue with the natural world and the spirits - remembering the story with the body - imagining your way into the story - the story as offering - story as emotional workout - maintaining healthy relationship with the story
Where does poetry come from? What helps that wild horse to arrive into our lives? An exploration of these questions by poet and storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
An interview with the storyteller, teacher, and theater maker Janardan Ghosh by Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
Approaching a story - story as storm, song, and animal - the story is not a tool - story as forest, story as traveler to be welcomed - the skills of the hunter - courting a story - our illusion of control - orality and literacy - story as dream - Jung's insights as they apply to story - stories approach us
A reading and exploration of part five of Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself" by storyteller and poet Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The Iliad brought to life without a script and without a net by performance storyteller Jay Leeming. www.JayLeeming.com
Part eleven of the Iliad, as told by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
A complete archive of stories performed on this podcast can be found at the website below.
www.JayLeeming.com
"The hard and strong will fall, the soft and weak will overcome": two poems from the Tao Te Ching, read and then explored by Jay Leeming, poet and storyteller.
www.JayLeeming.com
Poet and Storyteller Jay Leeming reads and comments on book one of Homer's Odyssey.
Note: Unusually for this podcast this is not a storytelling performance but a reading, for those who wish to dive a little deeper into the Homeric version of this story which has inspired my own.
www.JayLeeming.com
Notes from poet and storyteller Jay Leeming during his two-month storytelling journey through Greece and Cyprus in 2025.
A story from the Irish epic of Finn MacCool (Fionn MacCumhail) brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of the poem "Sometimes a man stands up during supper" by Rainer Maria Rilke.
www.JayLeeming.com
A deep dive into the craft of storytelling with performance storyteller Jay Leeming, exploring the creation of the opening scenes of his version of the Iliad.
www.JayLeeming.com
A princess born from a fire; a journey to speak with gods at the top of the world; a small boy who remains miraculously alive in an apocalyptic wasteland. These are three stories from the great epic of India known as the Mahabharata, brought to life through words and music by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
Storyteller and poet Jay Leeming explores canto one of "The Cantos" by the American poet Ezra Pound. Sequoia trees, blood for ghosts, and the dance of Aphrodite amid a shimmer of gold.
www.JayLeeming.com
"If you want to find out who you are, cut off your head and enter the forest." A story out of French alchemy, told and explored by storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
It's desperate times for the Greek soldiers as Hector leads his warriors against them, determined to burn their ships and maroon them on the Trojan shore.
www.JayLeeming.com
With Achilles out of the fighting the Trojans drive the Greeks back to the beach, where they all are faced with hard choices as the story of Troy continues.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of the American poet Gary Snyder's poem "Mid-August at Sourdough Mountain Lookout" by poet and storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
What moonlit god comes down to punish the Greeks with his arrows? What stray dog is the first unlikely victim of Agamemnon's wrath, and what the heck is that boat full of onions and cabbages doing in this story? The story of the Iliad continues, as brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of Pablo Neruda's poem "The Art of Poetry" by poet, storyteller, and musician Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of Robert Frost's poem "Directive" by poet, storyteller, and musician Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The epic of the Irish hero Finn MacCool (Fionn MacCumhail) comes to a close in this story brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of Emily Dickinson's poem "I heard a fly buzz when I died" by poet, storyteller and musician Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of James Wright's poem "Goodbye to the Poetry of Calcium" by poet, storyteller, and musician Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
When the Greek army arrives at Troy they encounter Cygnus, the indestructible man, and wrestle with the prophecy of Calchas which says that the first man to step ashore will be the first to die.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of the poem "The Diver's Clothes Lying Empty" by Jalal al-Din Rumi, as translated by Coleman Barks.
www.JayLeeming.com
Before you go to war, it's probably best to spend a year living as a dancing girl on the island of Skyros. That's the wisdom which this beautiful story brings to us, just in time for us to put on our own dancing shoes and sing our way into the deepening wilderness of this epic brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of the poems "To the Harbormaster" and "The Day Lady Died" by Frank O'Hara.
www.JayLeeming.com
When I got to the whispering forest and the dark I thought of the sacrifice of the horse, and how it bound us to the god of the sea and the way the horse's nostrils flared and later by the fire the branches devoured by flame seemed wrinkled ancestors confessing their bright crimes to the rain.
www.JayLeeming.com
An interview with the poet Steve Scafidi, who reads his poem "What if Faulkner is Wrong and We Do Not Endure or Prevail" and discusses laughter, oblivion, religion, high school, and poetry with host Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
Achilles is born and narrowly misses his change at immortality; meanwhile a storm drives prince Paris across the sea and to the palace of a particularly wild and beautiful queen.
www.JayLeeming.com
An exploration of the poem "California Swimming Pool," by Sharon Olds.
www.JayLeeming.com
An interview with Professor Joel Christensen about Homeric Epic and the possibility of regarding stories as living beings.
www.JayLeeming.com
The odes of Pablo Neruda explored by poet and storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The epic of the Iliad brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The epic of the Iliad, brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
Performance storyteller Jay Leeming brings the sprawling epic of the Iliad alive with all of its birds, thunder, and goddesses intact.
www.JayLeeming.co
A princess born from a fire; a journey to speak with gods at the top of the world; a small boy who remains miraculously alive in an apocalyptic wasteland. These are three stories from the great epic of India known as the Mahabharata, brought to life through words and music by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
Once again Finn MacCool stumbles into relationship with the Otherworld, in this story from the Irish Finn cycle brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
Do we live in a world of infinite possibilities, or of barriers and limits? A wizard, a blue snake, and a mermaid help us to explore this question in this story from deep within the mythic cosmos known as Stories from One Thousand and One Nights.
www.JayLeeming.com
Though these stories seem to focus on the exploits of Finn and his band of poetical warriors, the Goddess is always present in all her forms and liable to show up in the most unlikely of circumstances. In this episode Finn sets out into the wild but soon finds himself in a territory of weakness and forgetting unlike any he has stumbled into before.
www.JayLeeming.com
Here's a rowdy dream-vision involving a house thatched with feathers, pigs that never die and a sea-god for whom story is the fire that warms his house; it's the journey of King Cormac into the Otherworld as brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
Storyteller Jay Leeming and playwright Geetha Reddy discuss her recent adaptation of the Mahabharata.
The Irish epic of Finn MacCool, brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The Irish epic of Finn MacCool brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
There's trouble out there, big nasty toothy trouble and this life isn't just sitting with bread and honey by a warm fire. That's the truth expressed in this age-old narrative of innocence becoming wisdom, a primal building-block of story explored by storyteller Jay Leeming and who knows if on the way we might also meet the Buddha on the road?
www.JayLeeming.com
A live and unscripted riff on hunger, myth, and the origins of poetry by performance storyteller Jay Leeming, unedited and rowdy as an apple on a branch.
www.JayLeeming.com
The epic of the Odyssey brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The epic of the Odyssey brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The epic of the Odyssey brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The epic of the Odyssey brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
The epic of the Odyssey brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
www.JayLeeming.com
Could some stories really be 100,000 years old? A meditation on oral memory, story, and the constellation of the Pleiades, complete with music (played on the dilruba of India) for our winter darkness.
www.JayLeeming.com
Jay Leeming interviews the Welsh storyteller Daniel Morden about the Odyssey, his path to storytelling, and much more.
The age of Kali begins, kingdoms are destroyed and Yudishtira and his brothers set out for the otherworld, all in this final episode of the Mahabharata as told by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
Truth and lies, elephants and chariots collide on the battlefied of Kurukshetra, where the vows and desires of every character create a pattern no one could have foreseen and the battle in the world is revealed to be also a battle within.
The epic which began with the theft of a cow continues as all the fruits of action grow ripe on the branches of what's possible, leading to a battle in which even a god can lose his way and the razor-sharp choices of one woman in her past life lead to the death of the Grandfather of us all.
The Kurus and the Pandavas hurtle towards a war which it seems cannot be stopped, though Krishna does everything in his power to prevent it in this episode of the Mahabharata as brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
The epic of the Mahabharata brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming through the power of music and the spoken word.
Down we go, down the roots of this bright flower-loud world into the depths of the winter kingdom ruled by Hades himself. "The glacier knocks in the cupboard / the desert sighs in the bed / and the crack in the teacup opens / a lane to the land of the dead." So wrote the poet W.H. Auden, and by cracks and brokenness we learn who we are-- though the journey might also involve cattle-rustling, a mouthy youngster and the invention of the lyre. Let us go!
Princess Draupadi and the five sons of Pandu confront the limits of their powers in a wilderness alive with magical beings, mountains, and a speaking tree. "The Mahabharata" brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming
www.JayLeeming.com
www.Patreon.com/StoryJL
Performance storyteller Jay Leeming brings to life the Indian epic of the Mahabharata through music and the power of the spoken word. In this part of our story the Pandavas encounter powers greater than any they have encountered before; non-human powers who school them in humility and weakness. Along the way they meet the monkey god Hanuman, the sage Parashurama and the ageless seer Markandeya who gives them a glimpse of the end of the world.
www.JayLeeming.com
www.Patreon.com/StoryJL
Princess Draupadi and the five sons of Pandu leave their kingdom behind and begin their thirteen-year exile in the forest; the vast epic of the Mahabharata, brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
The story of Orpheus and Eurydice, brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Who's that stepping out of the bonfire? It's Draupadi, the princess who will change the world permanently and forever; who will witness the end of the third age of time and will even get to laugh hysterically for a few brief and beautiful moments.
Darkness and fire and the tree at the center of all things: storyteller Jay Leeming brings the Norse creation myth to life through music, story, and the power of the spoken word.
Deeper into the forest we go, tracking the story of the wizard-like teacher Drona to its source in water and in fire.
Deeper into the forest we go, tracking the story of the wizard-like teacher Drona to its source in water and in fire.
Why do the gods do what they do? What's up with all the weeping and washing in the Odyssey, and can baking five cakes in one day get us some answers? Poet Bethany Dixon and I sat down on a summer's day to explore the feminine characters of the Odyssey, and the result is a wide-ranging exploration of gender, the divine, and the good trouble of being alive.
Why do the gods do what they do? What's up with all the weeping and washing in the Odyssey, and can baking five cakes in one day get us some answers? Poet Bethany Dixon and I sat down on a summer's day to explore the feminine characters of the Odyssey, and the result is a wide-ranging exploration of gender, the divine, and the good trouble of being alive.
A blind king, a visit to the king of the fishermen, and yet another hunting trip gone wrong: it's part two of the epic of the Mahabharata, as brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
A blind king, a visit to the king of the fishermen, and yet another hunting trip gone wrong: it's part two of the epic of the Mahabharata, as brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
A plunge into the mythic cosmos of the Mahabharata, an epic story in which the destinies of gods and humans intertwine and the roll of a die decides the fate of an entire kingdom.
A plunge into the mythic cosmos of the Mahabharata, an epic story in which the destinies of gods and humans intertwine and the roll of a die decides the fate of an entire kingdom.
A king without a queen marries a river goddess who then does a few monstrous things; that's the news straight from the start of the Mahabharata, a beautiful Hindu epic in which gods and humans mingle in both lovely and destructive ways.
It's tough being a sage who lives forever, especially when the world crashes and burns and you're left crawling through an apocalyptic wasteland; but in that darkness there are still surprises to be found. A cosmic legend of murk, hope and mangoes from the Hindu epic the Mahabharata, as told by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
Theater director Sam Buggeln talks with performance storyteller Jay Leeming about myth, theater, the supernatural, and bringing the Odyssey to the stage.
A story from the first branch of the Welsh Mabinogion, told and then explored by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
Part two of the Welsh story of "Branwen, Daughter of Llyr," brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
A raven king, a magical cauldron and a talking bird: the Welsh story of "Branwen, Daughter of Llyr" brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
The power of blind chance goes up against the king of death in this fairy tale brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
A journey into the fierce yet healing story of the Odyssey, first through storytelling by Jay Leeming and then through an extended interview with Joel Christensen of Brandeis University.
A fairy tale found in a box in an attic in Hamburg in 2012, brought to life by performance storyteller Jay Leeming.
The storyteller Laura Simms tells "The Pigeon's Bride" and explores the art of storytelling in an interview with Jay Leeming.
The Norse trickster god Loki steals the golden hair of Sif, the wife of Thor, and thereby releases the rowdy desires of all the gods for fabulous and magical tools.
An exploration of the Naqqali storytelling tradition of Iran, with Morshed Saghi and Arash Ali Farhadipour.
Four storytellers tell the Russian tale of the Firebird: a live, improvised, cross-Atlantic performance recorded in March of 2021 by Lara McClure, Walton Stanley, Catherine Heinemeyer and Jay Leeming. An exploration of the story by the storytellers follows.
An interview with healer, translator and ceremony-maker Miguel Rivera on the poetry of Humberto Ak'Abal and our relation to the dreaming earth, preceded by the Seneca story "The Storytelling Stone."
A conversation between the Irish storyteller Clare Murphy and Jay Leeming in which the big rowdy questions of story and earth and the wide sky are danced with until the music of our questions itself disappears into the whispering understory of what we forgot we knew.
Bang! The red feather of desire is right in front of you on the forest path; your talking horse tells you to steer clear, but do you pick it up all the same? Enter the world of Russian earth-wisdom through "The Firebird," an ancient but contemporary story brought to life by storyteller Jay Leeming.
"The Woman of the Sea" told by Regi Carpenter, followed by an interview in which she and host Jay Leeming explore that story as well as her own journey to storytelling.
In this episode we explore the power of dreams, first through a story from the One Thousand and One Nights and then through an interview with the poet, author and healer Peter Fortunato. The result is a wide-ranging exploration of dreamwork, poetry, and our relations to the earth.
With Dionysus as our god we wander in the steps of a song-man fresh from the bush of ghosts, lurching perfectly through the story of Pygmalion to find ourselves in the rose garden of a king about to be granted the most disastrous blessing he could ever be foolish enough to ask for.
A story from the far north brought to life by Walton Stanley, followed by an exploration of the story and storytelling by Walton Stanley and Jay Leeming.
A telling of "Anansi and the Box of Stories" plus an interview with Brain Smolensky, author of the upcoming book Say Goodbye to Hollywood: the Climate Crisis, the Local-lore movement, and the Case for a Future Without the Entertainment Industry.
The story of the birth of the ancient Greek goddess Athena, brought to life by storyteller, musician and poet Jay Leeming.
A Siberian story of a woman who accepts the wild invitations of the wind, told by Daniel Deardorff and then explored by storyteller Jay Leeming.
Storyteller Jay Leeming explores "The Handless Maiden" with special guest Elaine Stanton.
Storyteller Jay Leeming tells the Grimm's fairy tale "The Handless Maiden" and then explores the landscape of the story with special guest Elaine Stanton,
Wildness and domesticity run off together to make a third thing sacred to the gods of death and sleep, a marriage between what we know and all that the modern world loves to forget.
A Norwegian myth in which a princess journeys deep into wildernesses both within and without, brought to life by storyteller Jay Leeming.
A poem composed on-the-spot by Jay Leeming at a reading in honor of the poet Tony Hoagland. Recorded at the Great Mother Conference in June of 2019.
An exploration of several stories from "The Arabian Nights," by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Stories from "The Arabian Nights," brought alive by storyteller, musician and poet Jay Leeming.
Stories from "the Arabian Nights," brought alive by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Stories from the collection known as "The Arabian Nights," brought alive by storyteller, musician and poet Jay Leeming.
An exploration of the story "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight" by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
The green riot of spring lives on even in deepest winter, even in the rough music brought into our humdrum lives by a magical knight who just might be a champion for the wilds within and without ourselves.
Gilgamesh and Enkidu journey deep into the forest on a quest to kill it's guardian, as the ancient myth is brought alive by storyteller Jay Leeming.
Get out and hike the images until they burn holes in what you thought you knew via this Georgian fairy tale that is a manual to making magic out of the dance of more and less.
A rigorous hike through a dream-landscape where drinking rainwater from the hoof print of a stag is what heals the animal in you who's going hungry in a bland world of ten thousand things
Myths and tales from around the world brought into the here and now by storyteller, musician and poet Jay Leeming.
Myths and tales from around the world, brought into the here and now by storyteller, musician and poet Jay Leeming.
A legend from the childhood of Merlyn, told by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
A Sicilian story brought into the here and now by storyteller, musician and poet Jay Leeming.
From the Caucasus comes this tale in which the theft of a golden apple leads to a wedding between the human and spirit worlds. It's a story that has the qualities of a dream-poem or a ritual, a crucial ceremony from the sea-swept beginnings of European culture.
Myths and tales brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Myths and tales from around the world brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Myths and tales from around the world, brought into the here and now by storyteller, musician and poet Jay Leeming.
Stories from around the world brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Stories from around the world brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Stories from around the world brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Stories from around the world brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Stories from around the world brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Stories from around the world brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
Myths and stories from around the world, brought into the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.
The story of "Rapunzel," told and sung into the here and now by storyteller, musician and poet Jay Leeming.
Myths and stories from around the world, sung in to the here and now by storyteller, poet and musician Jay Leeming.