Books / Spoken Word
Raise the Bar spoken word celebrate 4th birthday
Leading Bristol spoken word night, Raise the Bar, are rounding off their 4th birthday celebrations with a great line up of performers at Arnolfini on November 15.
Headline acts are Zena Edwards and Kat Francois, with support from Brenda Read-Brown and Chris White. Plus resident DJ Ngaio (of Booty Bass) will be spinning a selection of hip-hop, R&B, world music and UK underground.
Kat Francois is a performance artist, poet, actor, playwright, director, and comedian. She was the first person to win a televised poetry slam in the UK, on BBC3 in 2004, and a year later went on to win the World Slam Poetry Championships in Rotterdam. As a playwright, Kat has written and performed two solo plays, Seven Times Me, Raising Lazarus, and two comedy shows, Kat’s Got Your Tongue and The Kat Francois Comedy Show.
Kat has performed on radio and television including on Blue Peter and the Big Poetry Slam, and BBC Breakfast. She featured on Sky 1’s What’s UP in 2016, and has previously appeared on Sky Arts. Kat is a frequent contributor to BBC Radio, including Radio 4’s arts programme, Front Row, where she has been commissioned to write poems on themes including the First World War, and Women’s Rights.
Zena Edwards is a critically acclaimed poet and performer. She was recently Resident Poet at the Poetry Cafe in Covent Garden, and shortlisted for the first Arts Foundation Award for Performance Poetry. She has written and performed two one-woman shows, Security and Travelling Light, which toured nationally and internationally receiving great reviews. She is also a regular speaker on issues such as climate change and equality.
As a poet, Zena has travelled extensively around the UK, the US, Africa and Europe, collaborating with artists such as Nigerian choreographer Qudus Onikeku and award-winning visual artist, Theaster Gates. She has also supported Hugh Masekela, the Last Poets and Babaa Maal, and has shared the stage and been published in anthologies with Linton Kwesi Johnson, Sonia Sanchez, Lemn Sissay, Jean Binta Breeze and Roger McGough.
The event starts at 7pm on Thursday November 15. For more information, visit www.facebook.com/events/1094425750728626/
Read more: Interview with publisher, Sharmaine Lovegrove
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