Fun for all is on the bill at city’s free Summer Streets Festival
Sunderland’s Summer Streets Festival has announced the line-up for the 2021 edition of the festival with a line-up including Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs, Lanterns on the Lake, Royal Northern Sinfonia and New York Brass Band.
The annual not-for-profit music, arts and community festival, which usually takes place in Sunderland every July,isunabletooccurinitsusual format due to the pandemic.
For 2021, the festival will host a range of events both online and in-person events in line with current Government guidelines.
The line-up for the festival, which is free to access, includes:
::Visceral North East heavy metalers, Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs headline the first gig ever to be held in the new Pop Recs Ltd in High Street West, with support from experimental jazz trio Archipelago and Sunderland indie-punks Roxy Girls.
::Mercury Prize nominees Lanterns on the Lake perform anintimate,seatedshowatThe PeacockwithspecialguestsMe Lost Me and Nadedja.
::Royal Northern Sinfonia, orchestra of Sage Gateshead, return to the festival for a special streamed performance of Mendelssohn’s ‘Italian’ Symphony,conductedbynewPrincipal Conductor, Dinis Sousa.
::New York Brass Band bring their funky New Orleans sound to Roker seafront for a pop-up outdoor performance.
::A live performance and exclusive beatbox workshop for young people aged 9+
with four-time UK beatboxing champion, Grace Savage – presented in association with Chalk.
Other events include Born Lippy’s Poetry Slam, a friendly war of words between eight poets, hoping to win the audiencevoteandbecrownedBorn Lippy Summer Streets Slam Champion 2021.
There are also familyfriendly,audiodescribed,popupperformancesbyfemale-led alternative circus company LavrakCircus,whobringtheir UFO, the Beam Blaster to Seaburn; and Wildflower, a fun, floral, pop-up outdoor performance
by Curious Arts who champion LGBTQIA+ arts.
Online events include the premiere of a specially commissioned documentary that
followsthestoriesoftheparticipants of Sunderland’s Young MusiciansProject,afreegroup run by We Make Culture that offers young songwriters the chancehaveagoatmusic,meet like-minded young people and get songwriting support.
Festival Director, Ross Millard, guitarist in Sunderland bandTheFutureheads,said:“It is really important to Summer StreetsFestivalthatweareable to bring live music back to the programme this year. By hosting events both in-person and online, we hope that everyone willfindawaytoaccessandenjoy the festival.
“We’ve organised some very special gigs with some of the most exciting artists in the region, interactive workshops and local, national and international artists as part of the line-up. The festival is completely free to access and we’re hopeful that everyone will find something going on at Summer Streets that they can get involved with.”
Summer Streets Festival 2021 is happening from Friday, July 16 – Monday, July 19 and will take place both online and offline with gigs, performances and workshops happening across locations in Sunderland, as well as on online platforms like YouTube and Facebook.
All events are free. In some cases, tickets are required.