Part 1 of a two-part article. A seven-year-old girl is among those currently getting acquainted with the woefully neglected but important Jamaican pioneering poet, playwright, feminist and social activist Una Marson. The girl has been reading...
Louise Bennett was a good person and a skilful poet.” That pithy statement about Jamaica’s most loved cultural icon was made last week Tuesday by long-time Bennett researcher, University of the West Indies Professor emeritus Mervyn Morris. The...
Two different forms of the creative arts were offered to appreciative audiences on Sunday and Tuesday at two of Kingston’s major cultural institutions. The first – a collection of short films made by new film-makers – was shown at the National...
The figures tell only a fraction of the story, but they do indicate the success of the Jamaican Poets School Tour 2019. Led by Florida-based, internationally acclaimed Jamaican poet Malachi Smith, over a period of 10 days, 29 poets had readings and...
Today is National Story-telling Day and thanks to a memorandum of understanding (MOU) signed last week, every parish library in Jamaica will be holding a storytelling hour. In addition to this, the Jamaica Library Service (JLS) will begin to...
Keen observer of nature that he was, Shakespeare would certainly have known about imprinting, a biological phenomenon occurring in newly born birds and mammals that causes them to bond with the first large moving thing that they see, even inanimate...
The lights of New York City’s most famous street shone in Kingston for a couple of hours last weekend. They illuminated the Vera Moody Concert Hall at the Edna Manley College’s School of Music on Saturday and Sunday evenings, enabling audiences to...
A theatrical production, ‘Skip to My Lou – Lou’, which celebrates the life and work of Louise ‘Miss Lou’ Bennett-Coverley in poetry and play, is now on the stage of the historic Coke Methodist Church hall, East Parade, Kingston. It’s where Miss Lou...
“Across the world, cities are recognising the advantages of leveraging their cultural and creative industries to accelerate economic growth.” Kingston should do the same, says the director of marketing and communications at the Edna Manley College...
There were more than 60 offerings – including workshops, lecture demonstrations, performances and exhibitions – at last week’s 2019 Edna Manley College of the Visual...
Cultural icon Louise ‘Miss Lou’ Bennett-Coverley not only had a great influence on many of Jamaican popular musicians, but was the first singer in the island to produce commercial recordings. She started in 1950, Jamaica Music Museum director/...
As admission prices for regular theatrical productions continue to rise, the end-of-month free shows at the Bank of Jamaica (BOJ) and the National Gallery (NG) become more precious. People turned out in large numbers for both the BOJ’s Comedy Hour...
“The development of a society cannot happen unless people participate. You get participation through communication.” With that deceptively simple introduction, Dahlia Harris, one of Jamaica’s best-known communicators, launched into a complex talk...
Arguably Jamaica’s best known poets, Louise ‘Miss Lou’ Bennett-Coverley and Lorna Goodison are in the cultural spotlight just now. As of the week of her 100th birthday anniversary on September 7, the former is being officially celebrated by the...
Next Thursday’s lunch-hour production at the Philip Sherlock Centre for the Creative Arts (PSCCA), Mona, will be in honour of the late cultural icon Louise ‘Miss Lou’ Bennett-Coverley. Dubbed ‘Miss Lou: Distingwish Jamiekan – Celebratin’ A Legacy...
When I asked Noel Dexter a few years ago why he chose a career in music, his reply was, “I didn’t choose music. Music chose me.” The evidence bears this out. I, and others attending his thanksgiving service at The University Chapel, Mona, on...
Both the Jamaica Cultural Development Commission (JCDC) and the National Gallery (NG) clearly delight in presenting new artistic talent to the public. Recently, the two organisations, separately, turned the spotlight on creative writer, Rohan Facey...
After a three-weekend run in the tiny Blue Room in the Phoenix Theatre complex on Haining Road, the intriguing, energetic gospel drama, Behind the Pulpit, is to be shown to larger audiences than can hold in the 80-seat theatre. Discussions are also...
Shakespeare’s much-quoted admonition “To thine own self be true” was a dominant theme of stage and television actress Michael Hyatt’s talk at the Institute of Jamaica (IOJ) recently. While addressing the advertised topic, “Actualizing an...
On a recent, culture-packed day at the National Gallery of Jamaica, Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport Olivia Grange announced plans to further enhance the institution’s cultural potency. The gallery should have “a thrilling...
After receiving high merits and distinctions in all of the graded Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music (ABRSM) piano exams, two talented Jamaican teenage pianists are booked to fly off to the USA shortly for further studies. Sixteen-year-...
The first couple of scenes of the roots play Money Moves (written and directed by Garfield Reid), now on at 6 Cargill Avenue, very efficiently reveal what the rest of the play will be like. The mood will be amorous and the tone comical and there...
For its ‘last Sunday’ event in June, the National Gallery treated its audience to a performance by one of the most influential personalities in Jamaican popular music, Winston ‘Sparrow’ Martin. Leading a quartet called the Skasonics, Martin...
When the Edna Manley College’s School of Drama graduate, Lemar Archer, started teaching, he sensed deep distress among many of his students. In the theatre arts and drama classes he taught at Edith Dalton James High School in St Andrew, he...
The academic year drawing to a close at the Philip Sherlock Centre for the Creative Arts (PSCCA) of the UWI, Mona campus has been an eventful one for acting head Michael Holgate. Opened in 1968, the centre technically marked its 50th year in 2018,...
