Southbank Centre

Can classical music be protest? Can it make you laugh? Or is it just one big remix? In So Hear Me Out , hosts Gillian Moore and Linton Stephens dig into the big questions, uncovering unexpected stories, surprising connections, and the hidden humour behind the music you thought you knew. This is classical music without the clichés — and with plenty to say about the world today. 👉 Subscribe now to...

Historian and filmmaker David Olusoga joins journalist Nesrine Malik in conversation to chart the story of Black British history, bringing to light overlooked narratives. From well-known figures to individual lives consigned to the margins of history, how do the lived experiences of Black British people through time influence questions of belonging and identity? This conversation was recorded live...

Journalist and author Sathnam Sanghera traces the legacies of the British empire around the world, drawing on his book Empireland: How Modern Britain is Shaped by its Imperial Past, in conversation with Colin Grant. This conversation was recorded live in our Queen Elizabeth Hall on Sunday 14 July 2024, as part of You Belong Here, our summer programme of events inspired by the unsung stories and fo...

Renowned for his intricate, colourful knitwork and interplay with music and culture, Nicholas Daley has used fashion as a means to explore ideas around identity, heritage, and memory, intertwined with wider Black British and diasporic themes. In conversation were Pauline Black, lead singer of iconic two-tone band The Selecter, DJ and dub master Dennis Bovell, South London musician and producer Wu...

Out of the Kiln: From Technique to Concept presents Aaron Angell and Serena Korda - two artists who featured in the Hayward Gallery exhibition, Strange Clay: Ceramics in Contemporary Art - in conversation with exhibition curator Cliff Lauson and Isabella Smith, Deputy Editor at Crafts. They discuss working with ceramics, and explore how their clays, glazes and firing techniques give form...

In the Black Fantastic is a four-part podcast series inspired by the Hayward Gallery exhibition of the same name. This series brings together artists, musicians and writers in conversations that draw on the themes of the exhibition – curated by Ekow Eshun – including myth, science fiction, spiritual traditions and the legacy of Afrofuturism. This fourth and final episode brings together sculptor a...

In the Black Fantastic is a four-part podcast series inspired by the Hayward Gallery exhibition of the same name. This series brings together artists, musicians and writers in conversations that draw on the themes of the exhibition – curated by Ekow Eshun – including myth, science fiction, spiritual traditions and the legacy of Afrofuturism. This third episode brings together interdisciplinary fil...

In the Black Fantastic is a four-part podcast series inspired by the Hayward Gallery exhibition of the same name. This series brings together artists, musicians and writers in conversations that draw on the themes of the exhibition – curated by Ekow Eshun – including myth, science fiction, spiritual traditions and the legacy of Afrofuturism. This second episode brings together artist Lina Iris Vik...

In the Black Fantastic is a four-part podcast series inspired by the Hayward Gallery exhibition of the same name. This series brings together artists, musicians and writers in conversations that draw on the themes of the exhibition – curated by Ekow Eshun – including myth, science fiction, spiritual traditions and the legacy of Afrofuturism. This first episode brings together artist Rashaad Newsom...

In 2019, Jean Paul Gaultier brought his Fashion Freak Show – called a 'fabulous fiesta of fabric and flesh' by The Guardian – to the Southbank Centre. But before his extravaganza exploded onto the stage at Royal Festival Hall, the designer himself appeared here in conversation with TV presenter Anita Rani, reflecting on his decades in fashion. Born in a Paris suburb in 1952, Gaultier started his c...

Malala Yousafzai's activist work championing the educational rights of girls led to her being shot by a Taliban gunman in 2012, when she was just 15 – but she refused to be silenced. She came to the Southbank Centre to launch her memoir I Am Malala on Sunday 20 October 2013, appearing in conversation with former Southbank Centre Artistic Director Jude Kelly. The following year, Yousafzai became th...

Join poet Holly Corfield Carr, exploring human and non-human ways of looking at and listening to trees, in this podcast from Hayward Gallery's Among the Trees exhibition. Holly considers artworks by Giuseppe Penone, Robert Smithson, Roxy Paine and Mariele Neudecker, and interweaves her own words with poems by Vahni Capildeo, Emily Dickinson, Sasha Dugdale and Alice Oswald.

In this podcast, the painter George Shaw discusses some of the themes and influences behind his work with novelist Patrick Langley, in a conversation that ranges from post-war town planning, to punks, apocalyptic literature, woodlands and ‘the everydayness of the end of the world’.

In this episode of Think Aloud we turn our attention to poetry, and sit down with the London poet and founder of poetry collective Out-Spoken, Anthony Anaxagorou. With him we delve into how poetry can rewrite history, the ways in which he has developed and established his own voice, and how, when this is not a poem, he is not a poet. We also hear from South Korean poet Kim Hyesoon, for whom breaki...

German composer Karlheinz Stockhausen didn't just write new music, he created music that had never before been imagined, transformed sound, influenced musicians from classical to Kraftwerk to The Beatles, all while believing he was born on a distant planet. Electronic musician Actress and Southbank Centre's Director of Music, Gillian Moore spoke to Harriet Fitch Little about his legacy. "Stockhaus...

In this episode, Harriet Fitch Little asks is this a golden age for political humour? Why do we laugh at politics and do we need to? She speaks to joke writer for Private Eye magazine Tom Jamieson, and comedians Tiff Stevenson and Kieran Hodgson about the effect of current affairs have had on comedy. “Satire sits bleary eyed & unshaven in a cheap motel room surrounded by empty vodka bottles qu...

Invented in China over 2,500 years ago, the abstract strategy game Go is thought to be the oldest board game continuously played to the present day. In March 2016, the Go world champion Lee Sedol accepted a challenge to play against a computer program called AlphaGo. In the second game of a five game challenge series, the computer made a move no human in the game’s vast history would have consider...

In this episode, Harriet Fitch Little is joined by paralympian, TV presenter and children’s author Ade Adepitan, and children’s book critic Imogen Russell Williams to talk about the lack of diversity in children’s literature. “I suddenly started to get a perception that certain people did certain things, that main protagonists, that strong characters, that hero characters were all white, middle cl...

How do you make something not funny, funny? How do you deal with nerves? Who is your dream comedy sidekick? Do people expect you to be funny all the time? Which of your jokes goes down the best? Harriet Fitch Little brings you a Christmas special that reveals the tricks of the trade of stand up comedy. Listen to the questions we put to our panel of comedians about the highs and lows of their caree...

Inspired by the forthcoming Soundstate festival, Harriet Fitch Little is joined by Southbank Centre's Music Director, Gillian Moore; Susanna Eastburn, CEO of Sound & Music; and Dai Fujikura, composer of contemporary classical music. They discuss the trouble with genres, how writing music will never be the same and why they don't use the word 'classical'.

In this episode, Harriet Fitch Little talks comedy and brings you the secrets and what do you do if nobody laughs. She talks to comedian Dave Gorman about why comedians can't lie and what the qualities are of the genre 'Gormanesque'. Her co-presenter is Ken Cheng, Chinese Comedian. She brings up his joke 'geek student' video and how it went down, they realise they went to uni together and Harriet...

Ahead of EFG London Jazz Festival, self-confessed jazz amateur Harriet interviews eminent musician Orphy Robinson and David Jones, a director and programmer of the festival. They talk about where jazz can be misunderstood, how it defies the limitations of the 'genre', the vibraphone, and which type of music you should be listening to on a date. Finally, they answer the question 'is it the end of j...

For national #AskACurator day, we poached the programmers at Southbank Centre to ask what goes on behind the scenes. Harriet Fitch Little is joined by; Bengi Unsal, Southbank Centre’s Senior Contemporary Music Programmer; Debo Amon, Literature Programmer; Rupert Thomson, Senior Programmer Performance & Dance and Jessica Cerasi, art curator and author of 'Who's Afraid of Contemporary Art?'

In preparation for this year's Unlimited, Southbank Centre's festival celebrating extraordinary work by disabled artists, this episode features talks with some of the performers who will be appearing. Presenter Harriet Fitch Little talks to Jackie Hagan about how amputation spurred her on to make comedy, whilst blind musician, Baluji Shrivastav explains the background of the Inner Vision orchestra...

What does it take for a novel to win over a reader? What does it take for a novel to win a prize? In this episode, journalist and Think Aloud presenter Harriet Fitch Little is joined in conversation by Debo Amon, Southbank Centre’s Literature Programmer, to discuss how the way in which we read novels has changed, why 'shameful' literature is so popular, and whether the novel will stand the test of...