About Us

Akua Storytelling is led by artistic director Jan Blake one of the leading storytellers, who has been performing worldwide for over thirty years. Specialising in stories from Africa, the Caribbean, and Arabia, she has a well-earned reputation for dynamic and generous storytelling.

Highlights include being resident storyteller at Hay Festival, curating Shakespeare’s Stories, in conjunction with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust, and touring the award-winning The Old Woman, the Buffalo, and the Lion of Manding about the Malian hero king Sundiata Keita.

As well as regularly storytelling to children in school settings, Akua Storytelling works with educators to help them become better storytellers in the classroom, with brands to improve how they communicate their purpose, and organisations engaged in delivering social and environmental driven change internally and externally.