BBC - Radio 3 - Womad 2004 - World Wide Unplugged

WORLD WIDE UNPLUGGED

Listen to Roger Robinson's performance

Listen to Zena Edwards' performance

Listen to Sally Pomme Clayton's performance

Listen to Shamshad Khan's performance

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Four collaborations between spoken word poets and acoustic musicians, mixing world music influences with the power of poetry to create an unforgettable, boundary-breaking experience.

Trinidadian Roger Robinson was a founder member of the now defunct Urban Poets Society and of Chocolate Art. He was also programme coordinator at Apples & Snakes poetry until 2000. Roger has travelled all over the world as an ambassador for new British writing and is a tireless poetry activist and educator on the London scene. He regularly mixes poetry and music, and has opened for Run DMC and De La Soul and toured with Attica Blues and Speeka.

Zena Edwards is an enticing young poet from Tottenham, North London. She has toured extensively and uses sampling technology to blend her soulful singing voice with the sounds of the kalimba, or African thumb piano, as well as hip hop beats, jazz grooves and other traditional instruments. Her debut poetry and music album, ‘Healing Pool’, is full of innovation, eclecticism and traditional African vibes. She has performed on BBC Radio 4’s ‘Poetry Please’, a host of other radio programmes, festivals throughout Europe and the world, and recorded with Hukwe Zawose, Busi Mhlongo, Funky Zen and Melt 2000’s innovative Sanscapes project.

Sally Pomme Clayton has been performing for adults and children since 1984. She has a huge repertoire of stories drawn from all over the world, ranging from witty folktales to wild romances and haunting myths. Her performances combine poetic language, startling imagery, playful humour and atmospheric music. She tours internationally and works with singers and musicians, combining spoken word with sound, and has recently performed with London Sinfonietta and the Brodsky Quartet, amongst others. Sally also lectures on world oral traditions at Middlesex University. She has published several collections of stories and her latest book, ‘Tales Told in Tents’, about Central Asia, is published this year by Frances Lincoln. She also writes extensively for theatre and radio.

Shamshad Khan was born and raised in the UK to parents from south Asia. She was a member of the Commonword Writing Agency from 1997 to 2001 and is the Literature Adviser to the North West Arts Board and a member of Lychee Lounge, a dynamic collective of South Asian artists. Shamshad co-edited an anthology of Black women’s poetry for Crocus in 1999, has published poems and short stories in numerous anthologies and magazines, broadcasted on BBC Radios 3 and 4, and perfomred around the country and Europe.

The project is sponsored by BBC Radio 3, the Roots initiative and Apples & Snakes.

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