Puppet Uprising returned to its roots with the MAY-DAY CABARET, a potpourri of puppet shows and sing-alongs culled from over a century of counter-culture. Puppeteers came from near and far to perform works both old and new in honor of the workers’ springtime holiday, and we honored our audience both in the work that they do (see the list below) and in their collective ability to sing together—something that Puppet Uprising hopes to see make a secular comeback someday.

Lucy Schneider also treated us to some Bach tunes on the squeezebox before handing it over to her mom whilst she tooted her clarinet. Friday's Cabaret featured sing-alongs led by Emily Bate, Beth Nixon and Joshua Marcus, Lil' Ruth Bussey showed us her stuff on Saturday, and Jailbird Thunderheart offered up some heartbreaking worksongs both nights. Uprising MC Morgan F.P. Andrews had a performative lecture on the history of puppets and May Day monuments in his pocket, but die to technical difficulties was unable to present it. Oh well, maybe next year...

AMY TROMPETTER directs and designs puppet operas, pageants, and hand-puppet shows. Recent New York opera credits include Requiem for Anna Politkovskaya at Union Theological Seminary, Vaclav Havel's The Beggar's Opera at Miller Theater, Malcolm Williamson's rendition of Oscar Wilde's The Happy Prince at the Kitchen (and on tour to the Kentucky Opera), The Barber of Seville giant puppet opera at St. Ann's Warhouse (also in St. Polten, Austria). She lives in the Catskill region of New York where she runs the performance space/workshop Blackbird Theater.

ERIK RUIN is a Michigan-raised, Philly-based printmaker, shadow-puppeteer, and co-editor of the anthology Realizing the Impossible: Art Against Authority (with Josh MacPhee, AK Press, 2007). Ongoing theatrical work includes the epic musical shadow theater extravaganza The Nothing Factory, and various improvisational groupings of overhead projectors and musical instruments. Check out some of his print work via the Just Seeds Artists' Cooperative .

MORGAN F.P. ANDREWS is an author/scholar of radical puppet history and curator for Puppet Uprising. He began making puppet shows under the guise of Shoddy Puppet Company in 1998 and storred up a good deal of trouble in touring Mr. Block between 1999 and 2001. His latest projects include Puppet Uprising North America (a regional online listing of puppet happenings around the U.S. and Canada) and co-facilitating Theater of the Oppressed workshops with fellow joker Kate Wand.

LUCY SCHNEIDER is a profesional tailor and craftsperson who sings and plays the accoridon and clarinet in the Philly-area zydeco outfit Sweets & Hots. See her custom-made clothing designs at golucy.net.

MARIANNE EHRLICH ROSS is the director of Concerts in the Country, a company that presents multimedia events in the outback of Washington D.C. She has been involved with puppetry since she was nine years old and has worked with the Bread & Puppet Theater for 27 summers.

PENELOPE HILLFRAÜ comes from Bologna, Italy and has worked in the U.S. with the Bread & Puppet Theater and Paperhand Puppet Intervention. Her play The Passion of Mr. Right Flag debuted in Philadelphia in 2007 and has since toured the United States and Mexico.

SAM WILSON is a prolific painter and puppet revolutionary whose credits include work with World War 3 Arts in Action, the Bread and Puppet Theater, All The Saints Theater Company and Blackbird Theater.  Current collaborations with Jenny Romaine include toy theater workshops in New York City's public high schools and at Ryker's Island, leading up to Great Small Works' 8th International Toy Theater Festival which will manifest in Brooklyn this May.

JAILBIRD THUNDERHEART is the musical side of Anna "Bannanz" Whitehead, last seen at Puppet Uprising as Nadine the Queen Termite in MITE WE. Other puppet credits include work with Nana Projects' Parade School in Baltimore and Spiral Q Puppet Theater's Peace Camp in Santa Barbara. Hear her beautiful music here.

KATT HERNANDEZ has collaborated with a magnificently variated sea of musicians, dancers, and others, and performed in a vast slew of of subway passages, urban grottos, and troglyditical performace places, as well as other experimental and life-making spaces throughout the East Coast Metropolii. Find her on the web here.