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Press Release
PRESS RELEASE – 11 February
WOW FESTIVAL LONDON 2022
FRIDAY 11 - SUNDAY 13 MARCH
IMAGES HERE
WOW FESTIVAL LONDON ANNOUNCE WOW SOUNDS LINE UP - A SPECIAL MUSIC PROGRAMME FEATURING WOMEN, GIRLS AND NON-BINARY ARTISTS ACROSS THE GLOBE TO CELEBRATE INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY
THE LINE-UP INCLUDES WOW LONDON’S ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE MISS BABY SOL AND INTERNATIONAL ARTIST-IN-RESIDENCE INDONESIAN ROCK BAND VOICE OF BACEPROT
MULTI AWARD NOMINATED LAURA MVULA AND MERCURY AWARD NOMINATED JAZZ COMPOSER AND SAXOPHONIST CASSIE KINOSHI WILL PERFORM AS PART OF ANGELA DAVIS AUTOBIOGRAPHY LAUNCH
PALESTINIAN SINGER-SONGWRITER AND INSTRUMENTALIST RASHA NAHAS
SPOKEN WORD ARTIST RAKAYA FETUGA PERFORMING WITH MASLAHA MUSLIM GIRL FENCERS
POP PUNK PERFORMANCES FROM THE TUTS FRONTWOMAN NADIA JAVID AND DIY BAND BREAKUP HAIRCUT
THE FESTIVAL WILL ALSO HOST TWO DJ NIGHTS FEATURING FEMALE TALENT IN THE BOOTH, IN COLLABORATION WITH SPIRITLAND
WOW - Women of the World has announced the full lineup for WOW Sounds at WOW London. WOW’s special music programme is part of its annual London festival at the Southbank Centre on 11-13 March, supported by Bloomberg, to mark International Women’s Day. The weekend will see performances from artists across the globe who are using their music to create social change and further the feminist movement. Crossing continents, genres and drumsticks, WOW Sounds will get audiences dancing with joy in celebration of the resilience of women, girls and non-binary people everywhere.
WOW London 2022 Artist-in-Residence Miss Baby Sol will kick off the music festivities with a performance of her genre-defying music at the opening event, as well as performances throughout the weekend, including a free hour special set in the Clore Ballroom. The Congolese-born British singer/songwriter has written music to help various Amnesty International campaigns including ‘Stop Violence Against Women’. Her WOW Sounds residency is supported by PRS For Music Foundation. She will be joined by Indonesian Muslim all-girl rock band Voice of Baceprot (VOB), WOW's first ever international artist in residence who will be appearing digitally throughout festival events. The band formed in 2014 when they started using music to raise awareness of the lack of education for girls in their communities. As part of their residency, supported by the British Council, the acclaimed band will create new work and music videos about gender equality to perform over the festival period online.
On 13 March world renowned scholar Professor Angela Y. Davis joins the Festival live from San Francisco in a one-off, special event to celebrate the much anticipated re-publication of her blazing autobiography - An Autobiography - nearly 50 years since it was first published. Part of the celebration will include two unique performances from groundbreaking artists Laura Mvula and Cassie Kinoshi, using their music to pay homage to Davis’ lifetime of work. Emerging talent Cassie Kinoshi is a Mercury Award-nominated composer and alto-saxophonist who will be opening the event with a jazz quartet. The night will end with MOBO award-winning Laura Mvula who will be performing a special stripped back performance to honour Professor Davis.
Roundhouse Poetry Slam winner Rakaya Fetuga will be performing her work with Mashala fencers - a project making fencing accessible to muslim girls and using the sport to change perceptions. Rakaya’s poetry explores overlapping identities, faith and culture as self-affirmation. Berlin-based Palestinian singer-songwriter and instrumentalist Rasha Nahas will be playing a stripped back set. Rasha creates a sound that moves seamlessly between the resonances of early rock ‘n’ roll and the reckless echoes of free jazz, complemented by her distinctive approach to songwriting, storytelling and performance. These WOW Sounds performances will be part of ticketed events Friday at WOW and Saturday at WOW.
Hosted by Miss Baby Sol, WOW Sounds Hour on Sunday will be a special free gig featuring Nadia Javed, who has spent the past decade fronting all-female, all-feminist band The Tuts. Nadia will be performing her new solo material which explores identity and politics; delving into her hilarious and relatable anecdotes from her journey growing up as a working class British Muslim punk in London. She will be joined by Breakup Haircut, a DIY punk band bringing fierce basslines, humorously relatable lyrics, and a vehement determination not to recycle the same three punk drum beats.
WOW Sounds and the Southbank Centre’s Spiritland will present six of the most fiercely talented female DJs across two nights. Friday’s lineup will see DJ Paulette - a name synonymous with the history of UK club culture. The Manchester DJ has held residencies at some of the country’s most beloved nightclubs including The Hacienda, Heaven, The Ministry of Sound and Brighton’s legendary Zap club. Hilit Kolet brings a deep, refined and soulful house sensibility to her sets, forged from years behind the turntables, the mixing desk and the counter at Black Market Records. A recent track on Defected at the end of 2021 took her beyond the underground and brought national and international attention. The night will also bring Norsicaa, the woman behind Soundway Records, a regular in the Spiritland booth and a selector of immaculate taste.
On Saturday, South African DJ Lakuti will take to the booth. Now based in Berlin after a long residency in London, she regularly plays at some of the world’s most prolific clubs including Berghain / Panorama Bar, Lux, Nowadays and Chicago’s Smart Bar. Zakia is a DJ, collector, radio presenter and audio producer of rare talent, her NTS show is the highlight of a weekend, and her recent BBC Radio series My Albion explored her musical identity and background. They will be joined by Spiritland resident Frederika (Discs of Fun and Love) - an unmistakable presence in the DJ booth, armed with rare funk, soul and disco mixed to perfection.
Alongside the Angela Davis event, the wider line-up includes unmissable events with Black Lives Matter co-founder and former Executive Director, and TIME 100 most influential person Patrisse Cullors; Booker Prize-Winning author Bernardine Evaristo; author and broadcaster Elizabeth Day of the podcast phenomenon How to Fail; bestselling writers Lisa Taddeo and Pandora Sykes; Lucy Kirkwood’s searing, timely play Maryland, and a riotous festival finisher from Figs in Wigs - Little Wimmin - a brilliantly satirical adaptation of the Louisa May Alcott classic; bestselling author Marian Keyes, poet Warsan Shire, comedian Deborah Frances-White, activist Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan, as well as The Urgent Conversation led by Jude Kelly, a panel on the most pressing gender equality issues - with the timely programme and panel to be confirmed just ahead of the weekend.
Run by UK charity The WOW Foundation, 2022 is the 12th WOW London Festival. In 2018, WOW Founder Jude Kelly built on the success of the festival to create UK-based charity The WOW Foundation to run the global WOW movement that believes a gender equal world is urgently needed, possible and desirable. Since the inaugural London Festival in 2011, WOW and its partners across the world have reached more than three million people in more than 100 festivals and events across six continents. You can get inspired by listening here to the second series of the WOW Podcast, which celebrates the achievements of women and girls and takes a frank look at the obstacles in their way. Other recent events include November’s first ever WOW Festival in Taiwan, WOW Kaohsiung, and Shameless! Festival of Activism Against Sexual Violence in London, a co-produced festival by WOW and Birkbeck University of London’s SHaME project to address the global crisis of sexual violence.
Details of more 2022 WOW Festivals across the world, including the return of WOW Virtual Pakistan in March and the first ever WOW Rotherham, will be announced shortly.
WOW Sounds is WOW’s dedicated music programming, platforming revolutionary women, girls and non-binary activism who are using their music as a form of activism to create change in their local communities. WOW Sounds artists have included Anoushka Shankar, Nubya Garcia, Emel Mathlouthi, Fatoumata Diawara, Hope Masike, Muthoni Drummer Queen, Ditty and Rebeca Lane. WOW Sounds has worked with over 100 artists since its inception from 27 different countries.
The WOW Foundation is proudly supported by its Global Founding Partner Bloomberg, and Global Partner Mastercard. WOW London 2022 is supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England.
ENDS
IMAGES
Images are available here.
LISTINGS
11 – 13 March, Southbank Centre
thewowfoundation.com/festival/wow-london-22
WOW SOUNDS EVENTS
Friday 11th March
14:00-14:10 Miss Baby Sol performance at Friday at WOW - Royal Festival Hall
15:10-15:15 Rakaya Fetuga spoken word performance for Friday at WOW
17:15-17:45 WOW Sounds presents Rasha Nahas - Queen Elizabeth Hall Foyer
20:30-21:30 WOW Sounds presents Miss Baby Sol - Clore Ballroom (free)
20.00-02.00 Women Of The World Festival & Spiritland present: DJ Paulette, Hilit Kolet & Norsicaa
Saturday 12th March
Rasha Nahas performs during the obituaries for Saturday at WOW (BSL / STT) - Royal Festival Hall
17:15-17:45 WOW Sounds presents Miss Baby Sol Unplugged - Queen Elizabeth Hall Foyer
20.00-02.00 Women Of The World Festival & Spiritland present: Lakuti, Zakia & Frederika
Sunday 13th March
14:00-15:00 WOW Sounds Hour - hosted by Miss Baby Sol featuring Nadia Javed and Breakup Haircut - Clore Ballroom
19:00-19:15 WOW Sounds presents Cassie Kinoshi and Laura Mvula - Cassie will be performing a short set at the start of Angela Davis: A Lifetime of Resistance and Laura will be performing a short set at the end of the event.
ALL EVENTS
11 – 13 March, Southbank Centre
Under 10’s Feminist Corners (SOLD OUT)
Sat 10.30am for girls aged 6-7 years old
Sat 1.30pm for girls aged 8-10 years old
Sat 4.30pm for boys aged 8-10 years old
WOW Speed Mentoring
Friday 11 March
12.30pm-1.30pm, free but ticketed
Clore Ballroom at Royal Festival Hall (BSL)
Friday 11 March
2pm-5pm, £18 / £25
Royal Festival Hall (BSL & Captions)
Lisa Taddeo & Pandora Sykes in Conversation
Friday 11 March
6.30pm, £25
Queen Elizabeth Hall
Patrisse Cullors: An Abolitionist Journey
Friday 11 March
7pm-8pm, £10, £18, £28, £38
Royal Festival Hall (BSL & Captions)
Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan: Tangled In Terror
Friday 11 March
8.30pm-10pm, £10
Purcell Room at Queen Elizabeth Hall (BSL)
WOW Sounds Presents Miss Baby Sol
Friday 11 March
8.30pm-9.30pm, Free
Clore Ballroom at Royal Festival Hall
Grace Victory & Candice Brathwaite at WOW
Friday 11 March
9pm-10.30pm, £10 / £20
Queen Elizabeth Hall (BSL)
Women Of The World Festival & Spiritland present:
DJ Paulette, Hilit Kolet & Norsicaa
Friday 11 March
8pm-2am, £10
Royal Festival Hall
Saturday 12 March
2pm-5pm, £18 / £25
Royal Festival Hall (BSL & Captions)
Marian Keyes at WOW: Again, Rachel
Saturday 12 March
6pm-7.30pm, £25
Queen Elizabeth Hall (BSL & Captions)
The Urgent Conversation
Saturday 12 March
6.15pm-7.45pm, £10
Purcell Room at Queen Elizabeth Hall (BSL)
Bridget Christie at WOW: Who Am I?
Saturday 12 March
7.30pm-9.30pm, £10, £18, £28, £38
Royal Festival Hall
Warsan Shire at WOW: Bless the Daughter
Saturday 12 March
8.30pm-10pm, £25
Queen Elizabeth Hall (BSL)
Deborah Frances-White Stands Up at WOW
Saturday 12 March
9pm-10.30pm, £22
Purcell Room at Queen Elizabeth Hall (BSL)
Women Of The World Festival & Spiritland present:
Lakuti, Zakia & Frederika
Saturday 12 March
8pm-2am, £10
Royal Festival Hall
Sunday 13 March
11am-2pm, £12 / £20
Royal Festival Hall
Sunday 13 March
2pm-3.30pm, £15
Queen Elizabeth Hall
Sunday 13 March
2pm-3pm, Free
Clore Ballroom at Royal Festival Hall
Sunday Afternoon with Elizabeth Day at WOW
Sunday 13 March
4pm-5.30pm, £18, £28, £38
Royal Festival Hall (BSL & STT)
Bernardine Evaristo - Black Britain: Writing Back
Sunday 13 March
4pm-5.30pm, £15
Purcell Room at Queen Elizabeth Hall (BSL)
Angela Davis: A Lifetime of Resistance
Sunday 13 March
7pm-8.30pm, £10, £20, £30
Royal Albert Hall (BSL & Captions)
Little Wimmin
Sunday 13 March
7pm-9pm, £25
Queen Elizabeth Hall
Natalie Haynes in conversation: Women in Greek Myth
Sunday 13 March
7pm-8.30pm, £22
Purcell Room at Queen Elizabeth Hall (BSL)
NOTES TO EDITORS
About The WOW Foundation
The WOW Foundation was created by Jude Kelly CBE in 2018 to run the global movement that is WOW - Women of the World Festivals. The Festivals began in the UK in 2010, launched by Kelly at the Southbank Centre London, where she was Artistic Director, to celebrate women and girls, taking a frank look at what prevents them from achieving their potential, raising awareness globally of the issues they face, and discussing solutions together.
To date, WOW has reached over 3 million people in 30 locations on six continents, in locations including Australia, Brazil, China, Egypt, Finland, Nepal, Nigeria, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Somaliland, the UK and the USA. In 2018/19 WOW was in Rio de Janeiro, Cardiff, Bradford, Bangladesh, Brisbane, Janakpur (Nepal), Baltimore, London, Exeter, Norwich, Perth, Beijing, Ghana and Nigeria. In June 2020, WOW held its first ever worldwide online festival focused on women and girls — WOW Global 24. The festival travelled around the world everywhere from the UK to Nigeria, and Pakistan to Australia exploring the intersectional impact of COVID-19 on gender inequality, and responding to Black Lives Matter. In 2021, WOW’s first ever sold out Shameless! Festival of Activism Against Sexual Violence took place, co-organised with Birkbeck’s SHaME project.
Over the last 10 years the Festivals have developed a reputation as a space for world renowned artists, activists, thinkers and performers including Angela Davis, Malala Yousafzai, Annie Lennox, Patrick Stewart, Baroness Doreen Lawrence and Salma Hayek, to come and participate, alongside thousands of women and girls who don’t have public profiles but are doing amazing things. WOW provides platforms for people of all kinds, changes attitudes, brings communities together and provides a unique space for people to work together towards gender equality in their own communities. One example of the impact of the festival came in 2015, with the founding of the Women’s Equality Party by Sandi Toksvig and Catherine Mayer.
In 2018 Kelly left the Southbank Centre to run The WOW Foundation full time as a charity working to build, convene and sustain a global movement that believes a gender equal world is possible and desirable through festivals and empowering women and girls. The unique festival model creates numerous pathways for participants to take part in WOW projects, amplify their own causes, or start new initiatives which have a wide impact on communities. It is the biggest, most comprehensive and most significant festival dedicated to presenting work by women and promoting equality for women and girls.
WOW festivals and events are presented by arrangement with the Southbank Centre.
The President of WOW - Women of the World is HRH The Duchess of Cornwall.
About Bloomberg
Bloomberg – the global business, financial information and news leader – is a founding supporter of WOW - Women of the World Festivals. Bloomberg has long supported organisations and causes that advance gender equality and seek to address challenges women face around the world, from maternal and reproductive health to women’s economic empowerment and inspiring the new generation of female leaders. Bloomberg has proudly supported WOW Festivals since 2012 www.bloomberg.com/women
About the Southbank Centre
The Southbank Centre is the UK’s largest arts centre occupying a prominent riverside location that sits in the midst of London’s most vibrant cultural quarter on the South Bank of the Thames. We exist to present great cultural experiences that bring people together and we achieve this by providing the space for artists to create and present their best work and by creating a place where as many people as possible can come together to experience bold, unusual and eye-opening work. We want to take people out of the everyday, every day. The site has an extraordinary creative and architectural history stretching back to the 1951 Festival of Britain. The Southbank Centre is made up of the Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Purcell Room and Hayward Gallery as well as being home to the National Poetry Library and the Arts Council Collection. It is also home to four Resident Orchestras (London Philharmonic Orchestra, Philharmonia Orchestra, London Sinfonietta and Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment) and four Associate Orchestras (Aurora Orchestra, BBC Concert Orchestra, Chineke! Orchestra and National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain).