Our Creative Director, Paul Northup, gives us a tour …
So here it is – the first set of artists, speakers and performers who will be appearing at Greenbelt Festival this summer!
Because of the changes we’re making to the way we produce our Music and Performing Arts programme this year, we’ve focused early on booking those elements of the festival programme first and foremost. We hope you like what’s in store.
(And, because of this early focus, we’ve got more work yet to do yet on our Ideas bill – and there’s so much more also yet to share on our Worship & Spirituality, Comedy, Workshops, Children’s, Families & Youth programming over the coming weeks. All good things!)
If you’re reading this blog, you know us well enough to understand that: we’re not a festival-by-numbers; we don’t have the budget to buy in a raft of household names; and we’re not defined by a list of artists on a poster. Instead, we work hard to search high and low for just the right sort of artists and thinkers to bring to you at Greenbelt each year.
As such, curating Greenbelt is an act of love. And, much like any present you might offer to a loved one, there’s always that moment, as you hand it over, when you wonder if it’s quite ‘right’ and whether the recipient will like it.
So, in the spirit and vulnerability of gift-giving, let’s take a tour of some of the highlights in store for this year’s Greenbelt Festival offering: Hope in the Making.
Music
First up, our Glade Stage music headliners for this year are:
Friday – Nadine Shah
We’ve been wanting to bring Nadine Shah to Greenbelt for a long time now, so it’s a thrill to have her closing our opening night. A Mercury-nominated and much respected artist, Nadine released her fifth album, Dirty Underneath, last year. Live, she is brooding, mesmeric and all-consuming – not shying away from causes she believes in, most notably consistently calling for a ceasefire in the conflict between Israel and Palestine.
Saturday – K.O.G
Building on the party vibe that Dutty Moonshine brought to the Glade last year on our Saturday night we’re bringing back K.O.G to close our Saturday mainstage bill. After a Greenbelt debut a couple of years ago earlier in the evening, we can’t wait to see them tear up the Glade with their irresistible afrobeat sounds and energy – and K.O.G’s deep spiritual consciousness and commitment. We’re sure the field will be rocking from the front to the back.
Annie & The Caldwells by Eric Welles Nystrom, Kate Rusby, Nadine Shah, K.O.G
Sunday – Annie & The Caldwells and Kate Rusby
Sunday brings a double headliner, with the return of much-loved Greenbelt artist Kate Rusby with a sublime brand new album (and performing with a full band) for the first time in years. We can’t wait to hear Kate at the festival again and she will be joined by breakthrough gospel act Annie and the Caldwells, making their first appearance at Greenbelt, after bursting onto the scene over the last year with their authentic and unadulterated disco-tinged gospel joy – taking audiences to church wherever they play.
But our music bill is much, much more than just our headline names. Here are just a few of the other great acts to look out for this year …
French Moroccan desert-blues band Bab L’Bluz will blow your socks off. Beans on Toast is back to disarm you, win your heart and help you believe in a better world. Benin International Musical roll into the festival with a vibey mix of trip-pop grooves, hip-hop and rock drawn from their voodoo-meets-evangelical Beninese musical roots. Festival favourite Beth Rowley makes a welcome return with her band, fresh from a UK tour support for Ward Thomas. And one-woman whirlwind Fanny Lumsden joins us all the way from down under after wowing Glastonbury last summer.
Frankie Archer is a true one-off – making quirky electrofolk songs that transcend boundaries and genres and connect with all those longing for a fairer world. While family street busking band Gonora Sounds is led by blind singer/songwriter Daniel Gonora, a wizard on the guitar, together with his drumming protege son Isaac on drums. American singer-songwriter Josh Garrels makes his long-overdue Greenbelt debut with his heart-on-sleeve music of faith, love and justice.
After first seeing them play at the PalestineMusic Expo in Ramallah many years ago, we are thrilled that all-female Palestinian supergroup Kallemi will grace the Glade stage this year, their genre-fluid music organically blurring the line between hip-hop, rock, and R&B. After winning the 2023 NPR Tiny Desk contest, Little Moon come to Greenbelt with their bewitching avant-folk sound and story-songs that embrace love, loss and their complicated departure from the Mormon Church.
Sorvina by Lucho Vidales, Semler, Wolfgang Valbrun by Nina Cholet
On our Greenbelt wishlist for many-a-year, we’re thrilled that American artist Semler will be joining us with her band, after first breaking through in the States when they became the first openly queer artist to hit Number 1 in the Christian music charts with their EP Preacher’s Kid. After opening for the mighty Public Service Broadcasting on their UK tour this year, She Drew the Gun make deeply personal and political music that is as incendiary as the name implies, singer Louisa Roach’s vocals bemoaning governmental lack of care while calling us to a more empathetic way of living.
Sorvina is a New York-born now Berlin-based artist whose music was birthed in folk and storytelling and now finds its expression in hip-hop. While west-country act Sound of the Sirens never fail to wow audiences with their onstage harmonies, chemistry, camaraderie, and banter. The most streamed folk act in the UK in 2024, The Longest Johns have toured extensively in recent years, including supporting folk legends Bellowhead, and winning standing ovations wherever they play. The XCERTS must surely be one of the best overlooked bands in the UK over the last 15 years or more, making effortless and anthemic rock music with real heart and soul. While, last but not least, the force of nature that is Wolfgang Valbrun is a timeless blues-soul singer with a voice to die for, born and raised in new York, but now making musical waves in Europe.
These are just selected names. Dig into the fuller lineup on our website. And we’ll do a feature on the Rebel Rouser music soon.
Performing arts
Soothe, Bamboo by Jon Street, The Many Lives of PET #1, Jesus, Jane, Mother & Me by Craig Lomas
Featuring more shows than ever at the festival, our performing arts bill is bursting with goodness – inside and out.
First-timers to Greenbelt, Infusion Physical Theatre combines contemporary dance and circus with soulful touches of humour and poignance to create work that is accessible to non-dance audiences, tackling contemporary issues with a much-needed hopeful message. Their show Soothe is a response to the mental stress so many felt during and emerging from the COVID pandemic.
Returning to Greenbelt this summer, Michael Mears brings The Mistake, his play about the decision to bomb Hiroshima, 80 years on from that catastrophic event. Two actors, one British, one Japanese, enact the gripping stories of a brilliant Hungarian scientist, a daring American pilot and a devoted Japanese daughter, in this gripping, moving and thought-provoking drama.
Meanwhile, in the great outdoors, HENGE is a fantastic outdoor physical theatre show for the whole family with gravity-defying acrobatic tricks, dynamic Parkour and rhythmic beats from Motionhouse. We’ve wanted to bring the ground-breaking No Fit State to Greenbelt for so long, and so we’re excited that this year they will perform BAMBOO for us – a spectacular, high-impact, high-skill outdoor circus production using only bamboo and human bodies.
No strangers to Greenbelt, this year Pif-Paf bring us Right To Play – an outdoor piece inspired by and championing the principles of the Adventure Playground Movement, inviting us to turn giant bamboo poles, a big stack of play mats, and some big bits of rope into an Adventure Playground each day. While, since it first played at the Edinburgh Fringe to rave reviews, we have wated to stage Jesus, Jane, Mother & Me at Greenbelt. A darkly funny and moving drama from acclaimed playwright Philip Stokes about idolisation, growing older and the complex relationship between a son and a mother, this is a play that feels like it could have been especially written for a Greenbelt audience.
We love the playful and provocative work of Stan’s Cafe and this year they bring us a complicated comedy about a plastic bottle – The Many Lives of PET #1. Friends of the festival, Synergy Theatre Project bring us their latest play, Providers – a gripping, raw and real new play about family, money and what we do when we don’t have enough of it, it speaks to the reality of young people today, with a future that feels out of reach. And finally, the wonderful Worklight Theatre brings us their critically-acclaimed play, It’s The Economy, Stupid, a play revealing the human stories that lie beyond the economic story. Armed with bags, boxes and an old board game, the actors reveal how the economy wins elections, and why the force that dominates our lives is so bloody complicated!
Ideas
Adjoa Andoh, Brian Eno by Cecily Eno, Dara McAnulty, Bishop Rose Hudson-Wilkin
This strand of the festival bill is still emerging, but already it’s looking rich and rewarding.
Best known for playing Lady Danbury in Bridgerton and in its prequel Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton story, Adjoa Andoh is also a person of deep faith and a keen advocate of the difference genuine fair trade can make. As the first Black female Bishop in the Church of England, Bishop Rose Hudson-Wilkin returns to Greenbelt to be in conversation about her fascinating autobiography, The Girl From Montego Bay.
After a year away from the festival he’s grown to love, the wise seer Brian Eno is back with us to dig deeper into his increasing fascination with the connections between art and religion. While, considering his tender years, Dara McAnulty is quite the award-winning literary star – his work exploring his deep relationship with nature alongside campaigning around the everyday challenges and joys of his being autistic.
When we saw the title of Jayne Manfredi’s book last year – Waking the Women: Faith, Menopause and the Meaning of Midlife – we knew we had to invite her to speak at Greenbelt. Meanwhile, convinced that what we are doing on our farms and elsewhere on our planet profoundly affects the food we eat, the water we drink and the air we breathe (and, therefore, affects the health of our bodies and minds), we can’t wait to hear from Jenny Goodman, too
At last, it’s time for us to welcome Jeremy Corbyn to Greenbelt. An MP for 42 years, his expansive and lifelong campaigning for peace, justice and human rights has taken him across the world, advocating in senior roles for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, the Palestinian Solidarity Committee, Stop the War, the UN Human Rights Council in New York, nuclear non-proliferation, trade unions, employment rights, Indigenous rights and many social movements.
John Philip Newell is an internationally renowned Celtic teacher and author of spirituality who calls the modern world to reawaken to the sacredness of Earth and every human being. We can’t quite believe he’s never been to Greenbelt. Yet.
Against the backdrop of the wide societal concern and debate sparked by the Netflix series Adolescence, we are pleased to be joined by Rizzle Kicks’ Jordan Stephens, whose 2024 book Avoidance, Drugs, Heartbreak and Dogs is a brilliant story of self acceptance – exploring masculinity, mental health, addiction and heartbreak.
Lamorna Ash by Maria Ródenas Sáinz de Baranda, Leena Norms, Patrick Grant
Still only in her twenties, Lamorna Ash has been called “‘a new star of non-fiction” by William Dalrymple no less. She comes to Greenbelt to share the findings of her forthcoming book Don’t Forget We’re Here Forever: A New Generation’s Search for Religion. Leena Norms is a regular Greenbelter, pitching her tent among those who she has grown to see as ‘her people’. A writer, YouTuber and podcaster, Leena joins us to share about the wisdom in her new book, Half-Arse Human.
Liz Carr is best known for her role as formidable forensic examiner, Clarissa Mullery, in BBC One’s Silent Witness. In 2024, Liz hosted the darkly comic and painfully real BBC documentary Better Off Dead?, exploring the repercussions of assisted suicide, and why she believes it shouldn’t be legalised in the UK. It’s this she comes to be in conversation about at Greenbelt. And, recently awarded a Planet Earth Award by the Alliance of World Scientists, Mike Berners-Lee returns to Greenbelt with his new book Climate of Truth: Why We Need It and How to Get It.
Also known as ‘Birdgirl’ (after her longstanding blog and 2022 book), Mya-Rose Craig is a 22-year-old British-Bangladeshi birder, race activist and environmentalist campaigning for equal access to nature, to stop biodiversity loss and climate change, and to ensure global climate justice, all of which she believes are closely interlinked. Patrick Grant, star of BBC 2’s hit show The Sewing Bee, has a lot to say about clothes. How many we buy, how we value them, what they’re made from, and importantly who made them and where. He comes to Greenbelt to be in conversation with our ‘Craftivist in Residence’ this summer, Sarah Corbett – who returns to the festival with over a decade of honing her unique ‘Gentle Protest’ methodology, combining neuroscience, positive psychology, campaign strategy and beautiful handicrafts.
And finally in this whistle-stop introduction to our emerging Ideas bill, Sophie Pavelle comes to us to talk about her new book, To Have or To Hold, which celebrates the interconnectedness between species and the relationships that underpin natural environments.
No Fly Zone
Dougald Hine by Ingrid Rieser, Crys Matthews by Laura Schneider, Harry Baker, Haleh Liza Gafori by Beowulf Sheehan
Daily shows hosted by festival favourites
Martyn Joseph’s The Rising
Each day, Martyn Joseph will host his much-loved Rising show, but this year with a twist – as he will be joined by a singer-songwriter online from another part of the world. Two of his confirmed guests at the time of making our first lineup announcements are Crys Matthews and Dave Gunning. Crys joined us online during lockdown for one of Martyn’s online Risings during 2020. Hailing from Nashville she is among the brightest stars of the new generation of social justice music makers, blending Country, Americana, Folk, Blues, and Bluegrass to make traditional melodies punctuated by raw lyricism. While Dave is a luminary in the Canadian folk music scene, his music characterised by its storytelling and melodic sincerity, often highlighting the lives of underdogs and tackling significant social and environmental issues.
Harry Baker’s Worldwide Woken Spurred
As well as hosting his in-person Woken Spurred show this year, each day Harry Baker will be in conversation with a young performance poet from elsewhere in the world. Confirmed at the time of our first lineup announcements is Harry’s Australian guest, Luka Lesson. A former Australian Poetry Slam Champion (2011), Luka has featured at the mecca for slam poetry: the Nuyorican Poet’s Cafe (NYC), performed with the Queensland Symphony Orchestra and toured with respected UK rappers Akala & Lowkey.
Pádraig Ó Tuama’s homage to Poetry Unbound
Festival favourite and longtime Greenbelter Pádraig Ó Tuama will host a daily show loosely in keeping with his hugely successful Poetry Unbound podcast where he will be joined in conversation with poets from around the world, as well as sharing work from his latest collection, Kitchen Hymns: 44 Poems On Being With Each Other. Among his guests will be performance artist, translator, vocalist, poet, and musician Haleh Liza Gafori. Born in New York City and of Persian descent, Haleh’s own work circles around her translations of the Persian poet Rumi.
Plus, globally renowned authors, joining us online to be in conversation about their work and writing.
One of our greatest living novelists, Marilynne Robinson joins us online from the States to talk about the way in which her wonderful literary work is shot through with reverence, theological questioning and ultimately an insistence that we look more deeply at the things of life in order to unearth their real meaning. Her fans are myriad, famously including Barack Obama and Oprah Winfrey, and we’re sure that all those of us who gather to hear her live this summer will be awe-struck by her singular grace and fierce intelligence.
After an early career as a BBC journalist, Dougald Hine has gone on to co-found a series of organisations including the Dark Mountain Project. Together with Paul Kingsnorth, he authored Uncivilisation: The Dark Mountain Manifesto (2009) and his latest book, At Work in the Ruins: Finding Our Place in the Time of Science, Climate Change, Pandemics & All the Other Emergencies has become essential reading for many. Dougald will join us from his home in the small Swedish town of Östervåla – where he and Anna Björkman are creating a school called HOME, ‘a gathering place and a learning community for those who are drawn to the work of regrowing a living culture’.
A prolific award-winning author, Tim Winton has written no less than 30 books – his work being widely translated and adapted for film, television, stage and radio. His latest, Juice, is an epic cli-fi tale set in an apocalyptic future where the characters face a daily struggle for survival because of climate breakdown. His prophetic narrative is a wake-up call for a world where already much of what fills our news feels in keeping with the near dystopian future he describes. Tim joins us online from his wild west Australian home.
Other
Lost Voice Guy, Scarred Pots by Rachel Ho, The Empathy Museum presents A Mile In My Shoes by Tracy Kidd
One of the best and perhaps most unique things about the Greenbelt Festival programme is just how eclectic and diverse it is. To underline that, here are just three other bookings we wanted to highlight that demonstrate how rich and diverse our programming is.
The Empathy Museum presents A Mile In My Shoes
Visit an onsite ‘shoe shop’ housed in a giant shoebox, choose a pair of shoes – from a Syrian refugee, a war veteran or a neurosurgeon for instance – and then walk in them while listening to their story. A physical experience designed to explore our shared humanity and build empathy – brought to us by the wonderful folk at The Empathy Museum.
Lost Voice Guy
Headlining our comedy bill, Lee Ridley (Lost Voice Guy) is the first stand-up comedian to use a communication aid and the first comedian to win Britain’s Got Talent (in 2018). He’s travelled the UK extensively with his last two tours (I’m Only In It For The Parking and Cerebral LOL-sy), winning Ents24 Hardest Working Comedian Award in 2019.
Scarred Pots by Rachel Ho
Inspired by kintsugi, an ancient Japanese method of mending broken pottery with gold, ceramicist Rachel Ho will be leaving 120 scarred pots throughout the Greenbelt site for festivalgoers to discover and keep as gifts. Intentionally scarred to symbolise the fragility of our lives, the scars are then filled with gold lustre, expressing the mystery of new beginnings and new life, even in our deepest pain.
Plus much more to come
We’re not done yet! Expect more on children’s and families programming, comedy, workshops, and worship and spirituality over the next few weeks leading up to our April ticket deadline.