On the 60th Anniversary of the Bristol Bus Boycott, we present We Liming - an evening of Caribbean poetry and music at Bristol Old Vic, headlined by the legendary John Agard.
We Liming is a party of spoken word, poets, wordsmiths, calypsonians and a house DJ, who invite you to join in and go with the flow.
Featuring poets all of Caribbean heritage, the performers carry personal and myriad definitions of what the Windrush Generation and Caribbeanness means to them.
The event will be co-hosted by Dr. Edson Burton and Melanie Abrahams, and headlining will be legendary poet and playwright John Agard FRSL, alongside intergenerational Bristol-based and international artists.
The lineup includes calypsonian musician Tobago Crusoe, poet and artist Valda Jackson via her actor daughter Georgia Jackson, as well as Muneera Pilgrim and other local poets.
This event will be BSL interpreted and is part of Lyra Poetry Festival.
John Agard is a poet, playwright and short story writer who grew up in Guyana, where his love of language sparked from listening to cricket commentaries on the radio. He is well-known for his playful style and charismatic performances. Over his long career, he has won many prizes, including the Smarties Book Prize, the Queen’s Gold Medal, and the prestigious BookTrust Lifetime Achievement Award for an outstanding contribution to children’s literature. He is widely studied in the National Curriculum.
In 2022, Agard had 5 new works published. This includes three books for children: When Creature Met Creature, Windrush Child and Follow that Word; also a poetry collection for adults, Border Zone, and his first-ever collection of short stories, Inspector Dreadlock Holmes and Other Stories. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.
amaican born Valda Jackson is an award-winning visual artist, and writer. She was shortlisted for the prestigious National Windrush Monument commission in 2021; and designed the Royal Mint coin commemorating the 75th anniversary of Windrush. Her untitled manuscript, Jackson’s first novel, was shortlisted for the Bath Spa Prize, 2021 by Janklow & Nesbit. She is recipient of a Hawthornden Literary Fellowship 2023, and her short stories appear in anthologies including The Book of Bristol, Comma Press (2023), The Peepal Tree Book of Caribbean Short Stories(2018), Closure: Contemporary Black British Short Stories (Peepal Tree Press 2015), and online MMXX, Bath Spa University (2022)
Tobago Crusoe is a calypsonian, composer, musician and a performing artist with over 30 years experience. He won the Calypso Crown in 1983 with "Don't Cry Now" and "South Africa". Crusoe is well-regarded for his extempo mastery and ranks with the best in the artform. His compositions are unique and thought provoking and he has appeared in the films Paddington and Paddington 2 and the CD of the same name. Crusoe has performed around the world to international audiences, including festivals and events in Madison Square Garden, Turin, Barcelona and Germany. He was the Calypsonian-in-Residence at London Is The Place For Me Caribbean festival at the British Library in 2018. Currently the lead singer of Calypso outfit ‘Tobago and D’Lime’ he has a long history of musical collaborations including the legendary performers Mighty Sparrow, Calypso Rose and Singing Sandra. He was awarded with a position in the Sunshine Awards Hall of Fame for his contribution to Calypso music (2011).
Georgia Jackson graduated from Rose Bruford in 2019 with a BA in acting. She then spent Christmas in Neverland, making her professional debut as Wendy in Peter Pan at Storyhouse Chester. She subsequently joined the cast of Oliver Twist for Leeds Playhouse and Ramps on the Moon. Since then, Georgia has continued to have a busy and varied career across stage, screen and voiceover, most recently appearing as Stick Lady Love in Freckles production of Stick Man at Leeds Playhouse and Victoria Theatre in Singapore.
Melanie Abrahams FRSA FRSL is a curator, producer and mentor. She’s founder of the independent literature organisation Renaissance One and artists and organisations she’s worked with include Miami Book Fair, Chris Ofili, The Space, Museum of Modern Art (Finland) and the BBC. She was one of the curators and consultants on the recently unveiled Windrush Monument at London Waterloo. Her latest curated project This Is Who We Are is a newly-formed UK-Australian movement of intergenerational and intersectional women of colour artists and is within the British Council’s UK-Australia season.
Lilleith Morrison is a Jamaican writer, dramatist and a history and arts pioneer and educator. She achieved a BEd at Cambridge Univerity and later went on to pioneer the teaching of Black History in further education. In the 1990s she worked with parents and children in school settings to produce books they wrote together. In 2011, she co-wrote ‘ Memoirs of a Black Englishman’ with Paul Stephenson. Over many decades, Lilleith has produced videos, radio broadcasts and courses that champion equity and steer fairer representation of Black arts and culture and the lives and stories of people of colour.
Lawrence Hoo is a poet, his work is influenced by various experiences of growing up and around Easton and St Pauls, Bristol where he is exposed to a medley of culture, identity and heritage. The impact of social imbalance on minority communities has had a deep and lasting impression on who he is.
