by Abigail Willock
Leicester based spoken word company WORD! has launched a series of workshops culminating in a poetry evening tonight(THUR,OCT27) featuring Mellow Baku and Fred D’Aguiar to celebrate Black History Month.
The mental health based spoken word and poetry company has been running a series of online workshops, led by critically acclaimed Mellow Baku, encouraging participants to think about what black history means to them and to share individual stories through poetry.
Creative director Lydia Towsey said that black history is everyone’s history and spoken word is ideally suited to acknowledging and celebrating it.
She said: “Spoken word can provide a democratic platform for statistically marginalised and unheard voices from the black and brown community to tell compelling stories and be heard.”
The poems created in the workshops will be celebrated at WORD!’s main event of the month, a poetry special at the Attenborough Arts centre tonight, headlined by Mellow Baku, featuring Fred D’Aguir.
Lydia, who will be the compere for the evening said: “Mellow is a must-see sound word and visual artist and Fred is a multi-award-winning poet, novelist and playwright.
“We can’t wait for the 27th, it’ll be very much more than a one-off special.”
The evening will begin with a free workshop led by Fred D’Aguiar at 4.30, and will continue with a performance from Mellow Baku and then open up to an open mic session.
There are still spaces for the community to get involved in the workshops or sign up to the poetry special by emailing hello@wordpoetry.co.uk.
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