Lodestar with Tamzin and Finola

Jason Allen-Paisant is a Jamaican scholar, poet and writer. His work explores how Afro-diasporic artists and communities shape their futures through embodied philosophies, focusing on the intersections of poetry and philosophy. His second book of poems, Self-Portrait as Othello won two of the most prestigious poetry prizes in the world: both the Forward Prize and the T.S. Eliot Prize – a rare feat...

In this Creativity Challenge episode, Tamzin and Finola discuss whether or not they embraced the idea of "boredom." In the last episode, GRAMMY-nominated composer Emma O'Halloran pulled a card from the Oblique Strategies card deck – a deck full of creative prompts designed by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt. The card that came up for our challenge was "Do Something Boring." The sisters have NOT had a...

Irish composer Emma O'Halloran was fresh off the plane from the GRAMMYs when we sat down with her to discuss her nomination for Best Opera Recording. She is the first woman composer from Ireland to be nominated for a GRAMMY in the classical field. Her two operas – Trade and Mary Motorhead – received international critical acclaim. They were called “remarkable,” by the Irish Independent,...

In this next Creativity Challenge episode, Tamzin and Finola sit down to discuss the task set for them by award-winning film-maker Payal Kapadia, called "Correspondence." For the challenge, the sisters created video letters for each other. Finola wrote her video letter from snowy Sweden and Tamzin made hers in Morocco. Tune in to hear about the process of creating these videos. Tamzin and Finola a...

Our dream guest today is a writer and director making history. Payal Kapadia won the Cannes Grand Prix in 2024 for her sublime film, “All We Imagine As Light,” which was hailed by The Guardian as “A triumph.” She was the sixth woman to ever win this award and it was the first Indian film to be submitted to the festival’s main competition in three decades. Her films are captivating audiences around...

In this fun episode, Tamzin and Finola get together to chat about how they fared with journalist Hanna Liubakova's creativity challenge. Last week, Hanna Liubakova gave the Lodestar listeners the creativity challenge of going on a fact-finding mission about their home countries, and to present this information to the world in a way that would get people interested. And what fun facts they found! W...

Content Warning: In this episode, self-harm and torture are mentioned at approximately the 29:00 mark. “We in journalism say that whatever happens, you have to stay alive.” In this episode, we speak with the extraordinary Hanna Liubakova, an exiled journalist and political analyst from Belarus. Widely regarded as a leading voice in the free press, Hanna is a non-resident senior fellow at the Atlan...

Our amazing guest last week, pianist-composer Michael Stephen Brown, gave hosts Tamzin and Finola Merivale their first Creativity Challenge: Set your timer for 5 minutes and write about memories you might be forgetting. Inspired by Michael, Finola dove into her own memories of piano performance – from inspiring first teachers to distressing exams – while Tamzin reflected on old homes and the signi...

In this episode we sit down with Michael Stephen Brown, the New York‑based pianist‑composer hailed by The New York Times as “a leading figure in the renaissance of composer‑performers” and celebrated for his “fearless performances.” A graduate of The Juilliard School, Michael has been awarded many accolades including an Emerging Artist Award from Lincoln Center and an Avery Fisher Career Grant.&nb...

Why do we chase creative sparks that burn bright and hot one moment, only to flicker and die the next? In this debut episode of Lodestar , sisters Finola Merivale (composer / musician) and Tamzin Merivale ( writer/visual artist) introduce the podcast’s mission: to explore the messy yet magical relationship we all have with our creativity. They share why they decided to begin this podcast and how t...

Lodestar is a new podcast hosted by two sisters: composer Finola Merivale and writer and artist Tamzin Merivale. In Lodestar, we explore our relationship with our creativity. We will be inviting writers, artists, musicians and more to dive into the highs and lows, the successes and failures and everything in between. Thank you so much for tuning in; we hope you will come along as we emba...