I’ve got mixed feelings this morning. On the one hand, I feel elated after yet another successful night of stand up to a full house at Café M, but on the other hand I feel let down by Linköpings Kommun Kultur och Fritids Nämden.
First the positives… The night of comedy rocked. This was the fourth night and a regular crowd seems to be emerging, which was always the plan. It’s so rewarding to see faces and groups that have been before who are obviously turning the night into a regular social outing.
There were four comedians on last night. The opener was a guy called Henrik Blomqvist who gave the night a strong start and he was followed by Anneli Heed, who I haven’t seen perform before. Other than being a comic, Anneli also does loads of voice overs and dubbing for films. If ever you see an ad with a child’s voice on it, it’s most likely to be her. She finished her set with an amazing trumpet solo, sans trumpet, which was a real showstopper.
The second act was Kim Solman, who I like as he is one of life’s misfits and has loads of anger onstage (although he needs to fine tune his act) and the headliner was Fredrik T. Olsson, who is one of the writers on Sweden’s most popular sitcom ‘Svensson Svensson’. Unsurprisingly, his economy of language is impressive. This is not to say that he uses few words, as his act flows at a torrential pace, but every joke seems to contain exactly the right number of words to go from set up to punchline… there’s no waffle, in other words. I usually sit behind the stage as the acts perform and one of the great pleasures is to watch the audience react to the comedians. With Fredrik, when the audience weren’t throwing their heads back with laughter, they were beaming from ear to ear.
I was happy with my MCing. I got to improvise a little when two local drunks came in at the beginning ‘I don’t come and bother you while you’re sitting drinking on a park bench… don’t come and disturb us!’ and I also tried out a joke in Swedish which I have only performed in English before…. and it worked a treat, so I think I’m going to expand it for my gig next week at Komikaze in Stockholm.
That was the good… now the bad…
Kultur och Fritids Nämden, which is basically the culture department of the local council, have never been to see anything that I have put on. The head of the department, Karin Semberg, had promised to come this week, but (no great shock) she didn’t turn up. I’m not asking them for money, but support; even support by recognising that there are things going on in Linköping. If it was just me that was being ignored then it would feel a little bit better, but every independent artist in theatre, dance or fine art that I have spoken to in this town has had a similar experience. What galls me most is that they put out a series of glossy brochures where they say things like ‘We burn for culture’ (Vi brinner för kultur). Bullshit.
What we also have to remember is that they are paid a salary from our taxes to create an active cultural life in Linköping and yet the reality is they haven’t got a clue what’s going on at a grass roots level.
I’m now in two minds – Do I wash my hands of the council, give them the two fingers and carry on independently or do I try and take on (with the help of the other theatre/dance etc groups) the bureaucratic behemoth of the council and try and make Linköping a culturally exciting and dynamic place to be?
Tags: Comedy, Gigs, Linköping, moans, Stand Up
Ben! What you are doing in Lkpg rocks. I say: ignore the Kommun. If you don’t need money, what they have to offer you is minuscule in a world of blogs and other social media.
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If you can avoid the kommune, do so.
Kommunes are only good for SFI and educating your children.
For everything else, theyy usually screw it up.
Compete with the kommune, beat them at there own game and then they will make a point of coming to see you.
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