Borderings

Borderings brings together music, poetry and performance from the North-East- shaped by land, border, memory, liminality, identity and myth.

Come join the Borderings!

Set among Alnmouth's bonny coastal landscape, Borderings brings together music, poetry and performance from Northumbria, rooted in places, in spaces, in folk, in story.

Line-up (in alphabetical order)...

Tahmina Ali

Tahmina is a British-Bangladeshi, Geordie spoken word poet, producer, facilitator and creative practitioner. She has been awarded the ‘ABC Arts and Culture Award’ twice for her innovative and thought-provoking creations, and commitment to supporting the community through her work. Tahmina founded the Freespill poetry night, collaborated with Gem Art's Masala festival, has headlined poetry nights across the region and performed on large platforms such as the BBC.

ATFK

There'll be music from the innovative and genre-shattering ATFK. The duo of Amy Thatcher and Francesca Knowles take their instruments in explorative directions to create something dynamic, compelling and new. I can't recommend their latest album Repeat for Joy enough.

Jo Clement

Jo Clement is a working class Gypsy, Roma and Traveller writer from North East England. She is the recipient of a Northern Writers' Award. Longlisted for the Michael Murphy Memorial Poetry Prize and shortlisted for the John Pollard International Poetry Prize, Outlandish, is published by Bloodaxe Books (2022).
www.joclement.co.uk

Iain Gelston

Also performing is Iain Gelston whose phenomenal work with the Northumbrian Small Pipes breathes fresh life into one of our most cherished traditional instruments. Iain will also be playing the Half Long or Border Pipes.

Grace L. Lowthian

Raised in County Durham, Grace dedicates her time to the singular and combined creative practices of poetry, painting and collage, photography, videography and music. Grace has released two collections of poetry The Azygos Wade and Paris Papers.

Me Lost Me

Also playing is the incredible Me Lost Me whose textural and vital compositions are some of the best art to have come out of the region. Jayne Dent guides folk into so many creative landscapes, revealing all its routes and guises.

Tom Pickard

Parhaps, as one of the great instigators of the British Poetry Revival and an essential figure in the region's poetry since the 60s, Tom Pickard needs no introduction. Tom co-founded the Morden Tower Reading Series in Newcastle and through this brought poets such as Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso, Robert Creeley and Ed Dorn to the North-East as well as provide the first reading of Basil Bunting's Briggflatts, a modernist Northumbrian opus. Tom's collections of poetry include High on the Walls (1967), Hero Dust: New and Selected Poems (1979), OK Tree (1980), Tiepin Eros (1994), The Dark Months of May (2004), The Ballad of Jamie Allan (2007), and Winter Migrants (2016).

Sam Telford

Sam Telford is a poet living and working in Newcastle upon Tyne. He is the author of four collections of poetry: Back to the Bridge, Tabbash!, Newcassel and A Dream of the Sea. His poetry is marked by a colloquial register and a minimalist style shaped by the British Poetry Revival and the American Black Mountain poets. Recurring concerns include urban life, overheard speech, the philosophy of working class life, and the act of writing itself.He has collaborated with multiple poets including Mark Wright, Joel Everett and Samatar Elmi. His novella, Young Sick Bacchus, is forthcoming from The Big Ship (Newcastle/London) in 2026.