We’re delighted to be working with our good friends and Beat Carnival Centre tenants Beyond Skin for this year’s carnival parade – in partnership with the world’s biggest international music festival (as recognised by the Guinness Book of Records), WOMAD! Funded through Belfast City Council, young people in north and west Belfast have been learning Ugandan and Brazilian dances which they’ll showcase at our St Patrick’s Day carnival parade on Sunday 16th March.
Beyond Skin have also completed a project exploring Protestant identity and the history of Saint Patrick with a youth group in Portadown as part of the ‘Bric’ Programme, supported by The Rural Development Council, Northern Ireland Housing Executive, & TIDES training and funded through the EU Peace III Programme.
The young participants recorded and produced a short video about the project, which you can watch here.
The young people along with people in their community will be hosting a St Patrick’s day celebration event in Portadown when the video and an art banner produced from the project will be presented to the wider community.
WOMAD was founded by rock icon Peter Gabriel in 1982, when he thought of a concert involving artists from Africa. This idea flourished and bloomed into a vision of a much larger event incorporating music from all over the world.
Since then WOMAD concerts have taken place in 21 different countries presenting some 2,000 international artists playing to a live audience of over 1 million. Darren Ferguson (Manager – Beyond Skin) and Eddie Kerr (Derry-based community worker & playwright) had started conversations with WOMAD in 2008 regarding the festival coming to Northern Ireland. In 2012 Belfast City Council awarded Beyond Skin an investment through the Creative Legacies PEACE III European Regional Development Fund to start the WOMAD outreach plan, launching Ireland’s largest ever world arts programme.
Read more about these excellent organisations at www.womadbelfast.org and www.beyondskin.net.
