Awate Presents: About Us!
Witness paradigm-shifting music, movement and spoken word in an evening with Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan, Isatta Sheriff, Kofi Stone, TrYb and Susanne Xin.
The Eritrean-born, Camden-raised wordsmith, poet, rapper, producer and activist Awate curates this event as part of Refugee Week 2022.
He’s brought together a line-up of international artists, including resident DJ for the night TrYb, as well as live performances from poet Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan; MC, rapper, producer and songwriter Isatta Sheriff; hip-hop artist Kofi Stone; and performing artist and pianist Susanne Xin.
Suhaiymah Manzoor-Khan is a poet, writer and educator. She is the author of Tangled in Terror: Uprooting Islamophobia and poetry collection Postcolonial Banter, and host of the Breaking Binaries podcast. Manzoor-Khan is published in anthologies focused on resisting racism. She has written for The Guardian, The Independent and Al-Jazeera, and her poetry performances have millions of views online.
Isatta Sheriff is an MC, rapper, producer and songwriter, and has developed into an eloquent voice of a generation. Sheriff’s self-produced EP A Kind of Biography was released in 2021 on her newly formed label Doctored Sound, where she also released four new acts to the UK scene on The Miseducation of the Insta Generation.
Kofi Stone creates introspective and relatable soulful hip-hop. He released debut single ‘Stories in Pyjamas’ followed by ‘Nothing Ain’t Free’ in 2017. His debut album, Nobody Cares Till Everybody Does, was released at the end of 2019, and featured collaborations from Loyle Carner, Maverick Sabre and Ady Suleiman. In 2021, Stone returned with three new singles and a sell-out UK tour.
TrYb blurs the lines between genres from around the world. He is the host of the Afrotronic show on Threads Radio, Highlife & Sunshine on NTS, Thiiird Waves on Soho Radio and TrYb's Beats and Bass on 1020 Radio.
Susanne Xin is a Norwegian Vietnamese performing artist, pianist and music pedagogue. Inspired by how everyday moments and actions develop in cultural diversity, Xin creates a meditative and mindful landscape with a prepared piano and pushes the boundaries of genre and style through contemporary improvisation by connecting sound, text and movement.
Awate has past commissions or residencies with The Roundhouse, The British Library Sound Archive, Tate Archives, PRS Foundation, British Council and Counterpoints Arts.
Need to know
For ages 16+
Dates & times
Price
- Standard entryFrom £5*
- Concessions25%**
* Excludes £3.50 booking fee.
Book as early as you can to ensure the best choice of tickets. Ticket prices may be adjusted without notice to reflect demand.
** Limited availability. Read about concessions.
Tickets can only be sold through the Southbank Centre and our authorised agents, and can't be resold. You can return your tickets to the Southbank Centre for a credit voucher up to 48 hours before the event. Tickets resold on any third-party platforms will become invalid.
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Members get the first chance to book our entire programme of events, including go-down-in-history gigs, concerts with world-class orchestras, and talks from cultural icons and political giants.
Venue
Purcell Room
Our number one priority is the health and wellbeing of our visitors and staff.
Open 90 minutes before an event until the end of the event. Closed at all other times.
Our address is: Southbank Centre, Belvedere Road, London SE1 8XX. The nearest tube and train stations within 5-7 minutes walk are Waterloo (Northern, Bakerloo, Jubilee and Waterloo & City lines) and Embankment (District & Circle lines). There are also lots of bus routes with stops 2-5 minutes from our venues. For more information on getting here by road, rail or river.
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More information
Find out all you need to know about tickets, including concessions, group bookings, returns, credit vouchers and more, via the link below.
Get an overview of the seating layout of the Purcell Room by downloading our seating plan.
Toilets
An accessible toilet is located in the foyer.
A Changing Places toilet is located on Level 1 Royal Festival Hall next to the JCB Glass Lift, for the exclusive use of disabled people who need personal assistance to use the toilet.
The facility includes a height-adjustable bench, tracking hoist system, a centrally-placed toilet, a height-adjustable basin and a shower. The phone outside the Changing Places toilet will connect you with a member of staff, who can provide you with the key. The facility is open daily 10am – 11pm.
Cloakroom
The Queen Elizabeth Hall and Purcell Room cloakroom is closed. You won’t be able to bring any bags over 40 x 25 x 25cm into the venues, so please leave large bags at home.
We're cash-free
Please note that we're unable to accept cash payments across our site.
Purcell Room is located in Queen Elizabeth Hall. For step-free access please use Royal Festival Hall JCB glass lift to Level 2 and enter via Riverside Terrace.
Talk to a member of staff at the auditorium entrance if you have a disability that means you can’t queue, or you need extra time to take your seat. They can arrange priority entry for you as soon as the doors open.
Please bear with us while we update our access map to reflect the refurbishment of the Royal Festival Hall’s Level 2 foyer spaces. The step-free routes remain the same.