October 2025 saw the 8th bi-annual month-long Platforma Festival take place across the East of England, it’s a celebration of arts and culture by, or that involves, refugee and migrant artists. It’s spearheaded by London based Counterpoints Arts and is always co-produced with a host of local organisations. We were asked to be part of two very different activities.
The first, ThinkTank: Music, Migration & Displacement, was a discussion group organised by Britten-Pears Arts; an invited gathering of producers, artists and academics – including from both Bristol and Cambridge Universities. We spent a couple of days at the Red House in Aldeburgh, Suffolk (the museum and the former home of 20th Century composer Benjamin Britten and his partner Peter Pears) discussing ideas and laying groundwork for research and collaborations. Coincidentally, one of the invitees was Emmanuela Yogolelo from Manchester based musicians Amani Collective who we filmed back in 2021 for both our Sounds of Sanctuary project and Orchestra of Samples. For info, Britten-Pears Arts own the large prestigious concert halls Snape Maltings.
The second event was organised by Ipswich based Dance East, one of the UK’s leading dance organisations. Entitled Community Takeover, the all day event saw music showcases, talks, discussions and theatre performances. We gave a talk/Q&A about the history of Orchestra of Samples and the stories of refugee musicians we’ve worked with over the years, including those who’ve performed with us and those we’ve recorded (including both former Afghanistan National Institute of Music teacher Ebrahim Mohammadi who fled Kabul with the entire school and Cameroonian multi-instrumentalist Alphonse Touna, who we performed with at Bristol Refugee Festival for organisers Counterpoints Arts).
As it happened, one of the other artists presenting that day with his Status Creative project, and his Syrian protégé Darius he’s mentoring, was percussionist George Fothergill who also performed with us on Orchestra of Samples in the summer… definitely a small world with both events!
With big thanks to Tom at Counterpoints Arts, Angie from Britten-Pears Arts and Sophie from Dance East.