FREE | livestreamed | for Key Stage 3 – 4 students

Join this special FREE livestreamed event with author Jeffrey Boakye exploring Black British history through music, song and stories. Aimed at Key Stage 3 – 4 students.

This special free event inspired by the exhibition Beyond the Bassline: 500 Years of Black British Music explores key moments that have made an impact on Black British history. Aimed at young people, the session will involve an interactive journey through music and song with author Jeffrey Boakye in conversation with Aleema Gray (co-curator of Beyond the Bassline), with questions posed by students.

The event will explore the lives and songs of pioneering musicians, telling a wider story of Black presence in Britain. From musicians in 18th-century Britain, to the influence of West Indian migration and those who settled in Britain after the Second World War, you will hear how the sounds of calypso, carnival, ska and reggae have led to the popular sounds and styles leaving a lasting mark on British culture.

Students will be inspired to:

 -    Find out how music, song and stories raise important questions about Black British history
 -    Learn about key Black musical pioneers who have shaped British history and their legacy today
 -    See how music has been a form of protest, resistance and celebration.
 -    This event is suitable for Key Stages 3 and 4 (years 7–10), covering elements of the PSHE, History, Music and English National Curriculum.

Jeffrey Boakye
Jeffrey Boakye is an ex-teacher turned writer, speaker, broadcaster and educator, with expertise in issues surrounding race, masculinity, education and popular culture. Jeffrey was an English teacher for 15 years and now provides training for schools, universities and businesses on race, identity, masculinity and education. He is also Senior Teaching Fellow at the University of Manchester’s Institute for Education. Jeffrey’s published books include Musical Truth: A Musical Journey through Modern Black Britain (winner of the Quiz Writers’ Choice Secondary Non–Fiction Award and Winner of UKLA Information Books 3-14+), I Heard What You Said, Kofi and the Rap Battle Summer and Musical World: Modern World History as You've Never Heard it Before.

Aleema Gray
Dr Aleema Gray is a Jamaican-born curator, researcher and public historian based in London. She is the Lead Curator for Beyond the Bassline: 500 years of Black British Music at the British Library and the founder of House of Dread, an anti-disciplinary heritage studio. She was awarded the Yesu Persaud Scholarship for her PhD entitled Bun Babylon; A Community-engaged History of Rastafari in Britain. Aleema’s work focuses on documenting Black history in Britain through the perspective of lived experiences. Her practice is driven by a concern for more historically contingent ways of understanding the present, especially in relation to notions of belonging, memory, and contested heritage.