House of Figs

House of Figs is a collaboration between Beth Calverley (Poetry Machine) and Beth Roberts (Hands of the Heron / Hedera / Tryani Collective). 

Beth Roberts conjures soundscapes with her voice and pedalboard, creating an otherworldly choir around Beth Calverley’s tenderly powerful poetry. As collaboration & improvisation specialists, they take care to create a held space for audience members to taste the fruits of fibrous emotions. In their live set, House of Figs often perform adaptations of poems from Calverley’s collection ‘Brave Faces & Other Smiles’ (Verve Poetry Press, 2020), which Benjamin Zephaniah described as “a great collection with an honest, real theme.”

Beth and Beth hold parallel roles as Poet & Musician in Residence at University Hospitals Bristol & Weston NHS Foundation Trust. From hospitals to festivals, they set out to create a held space wherever they perform, illuminating the value of care for ourselves and others. As House of Figs, they have headlined events at Lyra Bristol Poetry Festival and Komedia Bath, and performed at Shambala, HowTheLightGetsIn, Green Man, WOMAD, Good Grief and Bristol Harbour Festival. They have been commissioned to create audio pieces for beloved public spaces such as Bristol Temple Meads and NHS hospitals. 

“Best sound experience of the festival” – HowTheLightGetsIn audience member

“The definition of wholesome fun” – Shambala audience member

“Hypnotic… radiates tenderness and awe” – Sabotage Reviews

The duo has been supported by Arts Council England to develop their creative practice, which they used to develop a highly original music+poetry theatre piece called The Awkward Guide to Friendship. Their mission is that no-one will ever again think: “everyone finds friendship and talking to people easier than I do.”

The show intersperses the duo’s own weird and wonderful experiences of friendship with original songs and a carefully curated tapestry of other voices talking about talking to people. Their first scratch performances of the work took place in Nov 2023 at The Wardrobe Theatre (Bristol) and Front Room (Weston-super-Mare), This was followed by an invitation to develop and share the work at Theatre Royal Plymouth as resident artists in September 2024, with subsequent well-received performances at Exeter Library and Bristol Improv Theatre.

For fans of: Simon & Garfunkel, Alabaster DePlume, Kae Tempest, Joni Mitchell