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PREVIEW: Welcome to my nightmare with Actually Gay Men’s Chorus

Following the sellout success of their Halloween performance last year, Actually Gay Men’s Chorus (AGMC) embrace their dark side once again as they bid you ‘Welcome To My Nightmare’. 

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Take your seats if you dare for an evening of music, mystery, monsters and the macabre to start this Halloween weekend off in devilish style.

Martha D’Arthur
Martha D’Arthur

Presenting the show and performing with the Chorus for the first time will  be the frightfully fabulous Martha D’Arthur bringing her unique fiendish yet fun style to the occasion. This will also be the first AGMC production as they enter their second decade and will be fronted by new Musical Director, Samuel Cousins.

Expect a stirring musical repertoire as diverse as Jekyll and Hyde, Alice Cooper, Rocky Horror and Adele as well as many other surprises.

With a glass of fizz and canapés on arrival, the audience is encouraged to enter the spirit and there will be a prize for the best dressed to thrill!

The evening will be raising money for Inclusion For All the National Anti Bullying Charity and The Rainbow Fund who give grants to local LGBT organisations who provide essential front line services to LGBT people in Brighton and Hove.


Event: Welcome To My Nightmare

Where: Latest Music Bar, 14-17 Manchester Street, Hove

When: Friday, October 28

Time: 8pm

Cost: £20/£18 concessions

To book tickets online (no booking fee), click here:

Allsorts reaches more than 9,000 pupils in Brighton and Hove and East and West Sussex schools in 2015/16

 

web-300Allsorts Youth Project reached more than 9,000 pupils in more than 150 peer-led workshops and assemblies in 19 secondary and primary schools in Brighton and Hove and East and West Sussex during 2015/16, says the organisation’s latest annual report.

The Brighton-based charity, which works with and supports young LGBTU people, also delivered Trans awareness training to several organisations, including the University of Brighton, Brighton and Hove Children’s Services, East Sussex Children’s Services and Blue Sky Foster Carers.

The Princes Trust, Hampshire Educational Psychologists and the University of Brighton were among the organisations that commissioned LGBTU awareness training sessions from Allsorts.

The year saw an increase in the number of young people at the six regular groups organised by the charity. The Weekly Drop-in covered a wide range of topics from sexual health and drugs and alcohol to mental and emotional wellbeing. Delivered in partnership with other organisations, the sessions were attended by a total of 171 young people with an average of 35 people per session. Of the total number, 62 members considered themselves to be trans, 19 were from a Black or Minority Ethnic background and 87 stated they had a disability.

The number of trans and gender questioning young people attending the Allsorts Transformers sessions increased to 56 during the year. They praised the lovely staff and volunteers and the structured drop-ins with an informal feel. Said one member: “Transformers makes me feel valid, normal and liberated.”

Similar positive feedback came from the 100 young people who attended the TAG under 16-Group and received 1:1 support. Building confidence is a key part of TAG’s programme, and it works “When I started I was more of an introvert, but people helped me come out of my shell,” said one member. “TAG had helped me come out at school,” said another.

Jess Wood
Jess Wood

The Trans Kids Group for primary school children who are trans or questioning their gender identity has grown to 14 members since it was set up in October 2014. “The group is proving invaluable to the children who access it,” says Allsorts Founder and Strategic Director Jess Wood, “and gives their parents a space to meet.” In addition, 99 parents attended the Allsorts Parent Group, with the number growing steadily during the year from 5 in a session in April 2015 to 20 in March 2016.

The number of young people attending the monthly Open Minds sessions has grown to an average of 18 at each session. The group fosters safe and supportive spaces for young people to speak freely about their mental health, share experiences and access support from staff and their peers.

Increasingly, social media plays a central role in the charity’s work, and during the year 442,926 visits were made to its website by 55,944 different people, and 86,365 people looked at Allsorts’ tweets.

The need for all this work was confirmed in an Allsorts survey of LGBTU young people in March 2016:

♦      88% of those surveyed had experienced mental health problems

♦      45% had self-harmed

♦      48% had contemplated suicide

♦     15% had attempted suicide

Among trans young people the survey revealed that:

♦      94% had experienced mental health problems

♦      49% had self-harmed

♦      55% had contemplated suicide

♦      17% had attempted suicide

The picture among under-16 young people is even more concerning.

♦      96% had experienced mental health problems

♦      52 % had self-harmed

♦      52% had contemplated suicide

♦      26% had attempted suicide.

“This year we have seen a huge rise in the number of under-16 children we work with,” says Jess Wood. “Half of these identify as trans or gender non-binary or gender questioning. Not only has this been an important expansion of our work linking into our schools work, it is also a welcome indicator that LGBTU inclusion is happening at every age among LGBTU children and young people.”

For more information, click here:

 

 

Brighton Festival announce Guest Director for 2017

Kate Tempest
Kate Tempest

Brighton Festival announce that the Guest Director for Brighton Festival 2017 is the acclaimed recording artist, poet, playwright and novelist Kate Tempest.

Described by the Guardian as “one of the brightest British talents around,” Tempest’s prolific artistic output across multiple disciplines has attracted her considerable acclaim and a unique range of audiences.  Having made her live debut as a spoken-word artist at just sixteen, she initially conceived of herself as a rapper, however she is now equally at home as a poet, novelist, musician and playwright – garnering extraordinary success in each field.

In 2012 her debut play Wasted (Brighton Festival 2012) was praised as “electrifying” and “ingenious”; a year later her self-performed epic narrative poem Brand New Ancients won the Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry and completed a sell-out run in the UK and New York, winning a Herald Angel at Edinburgh Fringe.

In 2014, her debut solo album Everybody Down was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize while the same year she was named one of 20 Next Generation poets by the Poetry Book Society, a prestigious list picked just once per decade.

Most recently her debut novel The Bricks That Built the Houses has earned her yet more accolades and a slot on BBC Radio 4’s Book at Bedtime. In October her highly anticipated new album Let Them Eat Chaos will be released through Fiction Records featuring new single Don’t Fall In.

At 31, Kate Tempest will be the youngest Brighton Festival Guest Director to date, taking the mantle from pioneering artist and musician Laurie Anderson, who led the 50th Brighton Festival this year. Other previous Guest Directors include visual artist Anish Kapoor (2009), musician Brian Eno (2010) and Burmese democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi (2011) who have all taken turns shaping the three-week programme of cultural events.

Kate said: “The arts should be social, not elitist. They should be part of our everyday life. They should be in our communities, not only on elevated platforms or behind red velvet ropes. Music, literature, theatre, film – these things are so important, they bring us together into the same space, they give us ourselves, they bring us to life, they beam our humanity back to us in all its hideous beauty. And in these times, with the fear spreading everywhere and the divisions between us deepening daily, we desperately need to remember that we are all part of the same thing. Nothing does that for me more profoundly or joyously than standing in the crowd watching a gig, or a play, or a painting. It’s like a little victory you get to keep forever. I want us to offer that experience to everyone.”

Tempest’s appointment as Guest Director follows a number of successful appearances at Brighton Dome & Brighton Festival. After her acclaimed play Wasted sold out Brighton Festival 2012, Tempest performed Brand New Ancients to two full houses in the Corn Exchange as part of Brighton Dome’s spring 2014 programme. In 2015 she headlined an exclusive Brighton Festival event alongside fellow wordsmiths George the Poet and Hollie McNish.

Andrew Comben
Andrew Comben

Andrew Comben, Chief Executive of Brighton Festival, said: “We are privileged to announce such a distinctive and singular talent as our Guest Director for Brighton Festival 2017. Kate Tempest is uniquely positioned to fulfil the role – her seemingly limitless creativity has led to a body of work that straddles an extraordinary array of art forms and has earned her fans of all ages and from all walks of life. She is also passionate about the arts and its power to bring communities together – vital now more than ever. I can’t wait to continue the conversations with her as we work towards creating a Festival for next year which I hope will be a true inspiration to all.”

Brighton Festival 2017 – which will take place from May, 6-28, 2017 – will feature exclusives, world and UK premieres from a wide range of international, national and local artists and companies.

Full programme details will be announced in February 2017.

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