‘The Kibbo Kift’ is a musical with Music by Maxwell Hutchinson and Book & Lyrics by Judge Smith. It was first produced at the Traverse Theater, Edinburgh, from 10th to 27th of June, 1976, and presented again, from 24th to 29th of August, during that year’s Edinburgh Festival. The following year, the show was produced at the Crucible Theater, Sheffield from April 20th to May 7th. It also received an amateur production at the Sherman Arena, Cardiff in January 1980.
The story is firmly based on the true history of the Kibbo Kift Kindred, a camping, Woodcraft and World Peace movement that broke away from the Scouts in 1920, under the charismatic leadership of John Hargrave, the youth leader known as ‘White Fox’, and which, by 1932, had metamorphosed into the Green Shirts, the most dynamic and interesting of the uniformed political movements of the time.
For further information about the Kibbo Kift we refer you to http://www.kibbokift.org.uk
SCRIPT AND MUSIC
Below you will find a link to the ‘KK MUSICAL: SCRIPT’. This opens a .pdf file with a full and detailed stage script of the show. The title of each musical number is a link to an archive recording of that song. We suggest that that you open this link in a new tab (‘Right Click’ for Windows devices) and then click on the original tab so that you can follow the script as you hear the music.
KK MUSICAL: SCRIPT
A 314 Kb .pdf file with links to an archive recording of every song.
A NOTE ABOUT THE ARCHIVE RECORDINGS
The recordings come from three sources:-
- A demo tape recorded by the band ‘Totem’, who performed for the Traverse Theatre production. (Robert Pettigrew, pno., Chris Murray, gtr., Mike Shearer, bass, George Morgan, drms.) Vocals by Judge Smith, Robert Pettigrew and Christina Matthews.
- Where a song was not recorded by ‘Totem’, tapes made by the Composer, Maxwell Hutchinson, and the Author, Judge Smith have been used. These simple, crude recordings were made to teach the music to the band who would be playing for the show.
- Where these two sources do not cover the song in question (most often this is where there are reprises of melodies heard earlier in the show) we have used an unofficial, ‘bootleg’ recording of a performance at the Sheffield Crucible Theatre in 1977. The band is ‘The Imperial Storm Band’, later to gig in the London area with Judge Smith. (Tony Britten, pno., Keff McCulloch, gtr., Ian Fordham, bass, John Hodgson, drms.) Vocals by the cast: Peter Brett, Pavel Douglas, Ann-Louise Wakefield, John Foley, and Stephen Earle.
The quality of the recording, and of the performances, is distinctly variable throughout, but the intention is to provide as complete a record as possible of a rather remarkable work.
KK MUSICAL: GALLERY A collection of photos of the 1976 & 1977 productions.
ARTICLE BY JUDGE SMITH ABOUT THE SHOW ‘The Kibbo Kift’ or What Happens when you are Persuaded to Write a Musical
We also intend to add a page of reviews of the show.
