Veranda: Summer Shake Down
Veranda is London’s flagship and O.G poetry and music jam– featuring a house band boasting London’s top emerging musicians, and an audience made up of minds ready for meditation, conversation and creative elevation. Veranda facilitates experimental live performance that prioritises Afro-diasporic narratives; opening up space for rhythmic dialogue + curious encounters.
The first Veranda of 2024 features JEMILEA WISDOM-BAAKO and KAREEM PARKINS-BROWN ft. a DJ set from MA.MOYO (RTM FM) and a house band led by our Musical Director NATE RICKETTS (Steamdown). Hosted as usual by our Creative Directors BELINDA ZHAWI + MALAKAÏ SARGEANT
There will be an opportunity to perform on our open mic. If this sounds like a bit of you, get in touch with a sample of your work before 20 June with your name and 'Veranda open mic' in the subject line. Shout us on bornfreejam@gmail.com.
Jemilea Wisdom-Baako (she/her)
@writerznscribez
Kareem Parkins-Brown (he/him)
@parkins.brown
Veranda x Talawa Firsts 2024
Veranda is London’s flagship and O.G poetry and music jam– featuring a house band boasting London’s top emerging musicians, and an audience made up of minds ready for meditation, conversation and creative elevation. Veranda facilitates experimental live performance that prioritises Afro-diasporic narratives; opening up space for rhythmic dialogue + curious encounters.
This edition of Veranda is programmed as part of Talawa Theatre Company’s festival of new Black writing and performance, Talawa Firsts, after a successful collaboration last year. Partnering for the first time with long-term friend of ours, TOUCHING BASS will be represented with DJ sets from BROTHER PORTRAIT and NAIMA ADAMS.
We will also be featuring TOBI ADEBAJO as one of two headliners, with a special guest headliner to be announced soon. Featuring the Veranda house band and hosted as usual by our Creative Directors BELINDA ZHAWI + MALAKAÏ SARGEANT.
There will be an opportunity to perform on our open mic. If this sounds like a bit of you, get in touch with a sample of your work before 20 June with your name and 'Veranda open mic' in the subject line. Shout us on bornfreejam@gmail.com.
tobi Adebajo (they/them)
@tobiadebajo
Brother Portrait (he/him)
DJ set
@brother_portrait
Guest feature
TBA
Naima Adams (she/her)
DJ set
@naimaadams_
GET::FREE x Talawa Firsts 2024
Playing on our company name BORN::FREE– the term given to the generation of Southern African youth born after independence from colonial powers – GET::FREE encourages, simply, the permission to liberate oneself, communally, on the dancefloor. The lineup of DJs are curated not based on genres or BPMs alone, but rather on the belief in their collective ability to raise vibrations for audiences regardless of their musical preferences.
The brief to DJs is to promote the best of experimental Black sound with unforgiving bass lines and melodies that will convert wall-leaners and bar-hangers into entities shucking out until they forget themselves. Tun up, let loose; get sweaty and GET::FREE!
This edition of GET::FREE is programmed as part of Talawa Theatre Company’s festival of new Black writing and performance, Talawa Firsts, after a successful collaboration last year. DJ sets from BORN::FREE’s ANXIOUS.SELECTA + FAT-LÏP plus more TBA. Live percussion from T-JAI.
This event will be held on the fourth floor of a concert hall venue and is wheelchair accessible. Find out more about the venue and your visit here.
Veranda: Carnival Warm-Up
Veranda is London’s flagship and O.G poetry and music jam– featuring a house band boasting London’s top emerging musicians, and an audience made up of minds ready for meditation, conversation and creative elevation. Veranda facilitates experimental live performance that prioritises Afro-diasporic narratives; opening up space for rhythmic dialogue + curious encounters.
This edition of Veranda is celebrating the origins of dub poetry with headline sets from MALIKA BOOKER and JAMES MASSIAH. A DJ set of dancehall, soca and funky house from 16THSS (Voices Radio, Recess) and a house band led by our Musical Director NATE RICKETTS (Steamdown). Hosted by our Creative Directors BELINDA ZHAWI + MALAKAÏ SARGEANT
There will be an opportunity to perform on our open mic. If this sounds like a bit of you, get in touch with a sample of your work before 22 August with your name and 'Veranda open mic' in the subject line. Shout us on bornfreejam@gmail.com.
James Massiah (he/him)
@jamesmassiah
Malika Booker (she/her)
@malika.booker
2024 Writers' Collective
APPLY NOW! Deadline Extended to 03/04/2024
We are excited to announce that we are looking for up to twelve Black writers to join us in our second cohort of our annual Writers Collective. This year we are running sessions fortnightly between May-August with our Showcase in October– all of which will be hosted by our mates at South London Gallery.
All of the details are in the application pack below. You can fill out the expression of interest form below– we look forward to reading your work!
Top Doll launch – with Karen McCarthy Woolf + Friends
BORN::FREE brings you an interdisciplinary launch event for Top Doll, the debut novel by acclaimed poet Karen McCarthy Woolf, in association with Dialogue Books and supported by Reference Point.