Our Story
Melody of Kin was founded in 2025 by actor -writer Liam Donaldson as a home for the stories he wanted to hear. and a way to tell them to others.
We believe theatre should make you feel-not just think.
Our work is atmospheric, sensory, and built on the belief that connection across time is possible, even necessary to help us define ourselves.
''Stories before the cold'' is our founding artistic vision and first season of plays:
These are the tales before winter comes, before memory fades, before the cold takes it all.
The company launches with three complete stories ready for production With a mission to challenge and transform the audience experience
Liam Donaldson
Founder / Writer / Actor
''I founded Melody of Kin to create stories that are both visceral and vivid — to remind people what it means to be present in a theatre.
To make them look.
To make them feel something strange and alive.''
Liam is a Scottish actor-writer from the highlands. His work combines poetic language with immersive staging to create experiences that linger long after the lights go up.
The Stories before the cold Trilogy.
Three plays. Three deeply human stories. Written in Three months.
Liam is self-taught in design and branding, shaping both the visual and creative design for Melody of Kin.
My Oh My Mr. Dream is the first of the season and marks his debut at the Edinburgh fringe as both playwright and performer.
A 2023 Graduate from the Manchester school of theatre, Liam's training credits include Jeckyll and Hyde (Robert Louis-Stevenson, adapted by Evan Placey), Oppenheimer (By Tom Morton-Smith), Mary Stuart (Friedrich Schiller, adapted by David Harrower).
About the company:
Melody of kin collaborates with directors, designers, and artists who share our commitment to stories that matter. For at its heart its about connection — between generations, between memory and myth, between the living and the imagined.
THE VISION
who?
We are a rebellion against the muted world- a movement found on the principle that theatre must offer escape, not just commentary. We are led by the Writer-performer ensuring the vividness of the vision. Our mission is to transform the stage into a space for shared experience, telling stories that refuse to be forgotten. ''Then it is you who would have your self buried and forgotten, In this room. Accompanied by beasts and sunflowers who have no use for your contents.'' -Silicone Eyes
What?
Our aesthetic is defined by: Mythic scope: We ground vast, existential themes( time, memory, loneliness, the fate of the universe) in intimate, poetic moments. Sensory ritual: We treat design as a character. Sound, light, and even scent are used as tools to immerse the audience. The actors instrument: Our plays are designed to be high-impact experiences for the performer, fusing charisma and vulnerability to create an engaging guide for the audience. ''He could hear their cries through the walls calling for him, the scrabbling stampede of a thousand claws even the sound of the little trumpeter toot-toot-tooting away. The clash at crumbs end.'' -Mr. Dream
Why?
Why does it matter? We think that in a fragmented, noisy world. offering a space for collective remembrance is needed. That through rejecting disposible, predictable and easily forgotten work and instead focusing on essential storytelling. We can create work that is profound and meaningful and maybe even for a moment, dangerous. ''Like all those around it, they've waited for this moment. Only a blink to me and you — but to them? To them, it's the moment they're finally free. Each one lived and died on this tree.'' - The oak on Tighnasith hall
Stories before the cold
Melody of kins founding project is a trilogy of plays about what persists when everything else is gone:
My Oh My Mr. Dream
The cosmic tale
A cosmic entity born at the big bang emerges to tell three dreams before the universe grows cold. When the stories end he calls out into the darkness. Will you answer?
Silicone eyes
The technological tale
Deep beneath the sea, an android asks his assistant to help him remember. His mind is failing-purging the past to survive the present, Together they must answer an impossible question.
What does it mean to have been alive?
The Oak on Tighnasith hall
The generational tale
An ancient Oak tree doesn't bend time - it reveals time as it truly is. Beneath it branches, a grieving grandson meets his seventeen- year old grandfather. The tree has held this moment for seventy years. They must understand what was taken and what remains, some wounds span generations. some stories demand to be told.
Is this connection across time possible or is it already lost?
