Reverberate

RE-DISCOVER | RE-IMAGINE | RE-CREATE

Reverberate funded grassroots organisations to run small, locally-based projects that enabled and empowered young people aged 11-25 to re-discover, re-imagine and re-create their local heritage through creativity, then share that vision with their communities.

Applications closed in September 2020 and we received 37 applications from youth organisations across the country. Our panel (including Young Producers) selected 14 projects who each received grants of up to £2,000, for their projects that explored the places, voices and activities that make the local heritage unique, engaging critically and creatively with the past to create a broader view of what heritage is and who owns it.

Find out more about what they all got up to below!

Young Artist Response Piece - Sara Heroua

Lasses and Lyrics

We Make Culture’s “Lasses and Lyrics” project supported young womxn musicians to uncover forgotten stories of women in Sunderland and write, perform and record original songs based on them.

We discovered these wearside women through public story submissions, heritage research and guest speakers including Dr. Sarah Hellawell from the University of Sunderland and musician Eve Simpson.

It was a new challenge and the first time songwriting to both brief and deadline. We’re so pleased with the work we’ve created whilst facing different types of isolation as well as Lockdown restrictions that changed four times in our area during the project.

Our Lasses and Lyrics artwork was specially commissioned and is by young Sunderland based designer, Sara Heraoua.

Listen to the songs here

The Preston Project

Blaze Arts’s interactive youth-led project ‘The Preston Project’ explored and celebrated Preston’s cultural heritage whilst showcasing Preston’s diverse, creative talent. The project saw a group of young people based in Preston connecting with other young people, collecting stories through poetry, art, videos and photography. The exciting research-based project has been collated in a zine for you to explore whilst also documenting the process of the project on Instagram which you can see at @harrisyoungproducers.

Read the Zine

Step Your Way

Soul Rawkus – Young dancers from around Portsmouth explored Portsmouth’s maritime heritage and the links between hornpipe steps and African style dance from the 1800s, and popular dance of the modern era. The dancers particularly enjoyed the experience of working to live music as well as an electronic remix.

Door 84 Through the Decades

Door 84 Youth & Community Centre have created a documentary based on the history of the Door 84 building and the people that have attended the youth services both past and present to celebrate the charity’s 50th Anniversary. We interviewed members of the Door 84 team and previous participants from the youth groups to uncover their experiences. Door 84 has also had help from a local community artist to create animations to go alongside the interview.

Our Queer History

Our Queer History was a youth-led project which looked at different ways to explore the queer history of Brighton and Hove. This zine was a way to capture those conversations and experiences.

The pages here record some of our thoughts and conversations from the eight weeks, and we hope they are helpful in demonstrating the thoughts, interests, and concerns of young people in regards to our queer identities and histories. We have grouped the pages by the key themes we discussed during the sessions.

Read the Zine

The Revolutionaries of Littlemore Hospital

Revolutionaries of Littlemoor Hospital was a research project led by My Life My Choice’s young persons’ group. Littlemore Hospital was a long-stay hospital located in Littlemore, Oxford which closed in 1998. Those who lived there were people with learning disabilities. We created several things whilst working on this project based on what was discovered including a film and an easy read report. They have also reimagined what they learned into stories and recipes. Visit the website to see what young people’s creations.

Although the research has ended, the team don’t want the patients of Littlemore Hospital to be forgotten again. They would like to memorialise those who lived at Littlemore Hospital. They hope to do this with a garden memorial. This is something that they are looking into and hope to create soon.

Read the easy read report

Faith In Queen's Park

During November and December 2020 some members from Fusion Youth choir which is part of Faith In Queen’s Park took part in a history project on zoom that explored the history of Bedford and the Caribbean people that have settled there. We had a variety of wonderful guests each ready to educate the group in their own way. From local folk singers to Caribbean nurses, to Keeper’s of history, to stories of the Windrush generation, and Caribbean folk songs and stories. It was an engaging way to learn about the history of our town and hear tales from the Caribbean first hand.

We celebrated the end of the project with a presentation night which is available to watch on Youtube. There are some wonderful moments in the video where the young people present their findings in their own unique way. Such as a beautiful dance by Meagan Chase in response to Jack Sharps session where he played us his musical interpretation of a Bedfordshire folk song called ‘Lacemaker’ and what fun we had at the end as we all learnt the fabulous Calypso song composed by the young group incorporating some of the facts they had learnt over the 6 weeks.

'Lace Maker'

An interpretation of Bedfordshire folk song ‘Lace Maker’. Music composition and vocals by Jack Sharp. Choreographed and performed by Meagan Chase.

Bedford's Caribbean Connections: Best Bits

The best bits from the Bedford’s Caribbean Connections heritage project. Delivered by Johanne Hudson-Lett and Just Purple Presents.

Brick Lane and Bengal: musical roots in East London

Members of the Grand Union Music Theatre Re:Generation Band created a ‘radio broadcast’, delving into the musical roots, heritage and culture of East London. They chose to explore particularly the experience of Bangladeshi immigrants, through interviews with local community leaders and Bengali musicians, creating their own musical response through musical compositions based on South Asian ragas and time cycles.

The piece intersperses the sounds of the East London streetscape with audio recordings taken in Brick Lane, together with Bengali musicians describing their cultural heritage, the experience of migrating to the UK, and their musical expertise. Exploring the intersection of these in a broad interpretation of what heritage is and who it is for, the young musicians immerse the listener in the sounds of East London, Bengali life and music expressing this cultural heritage and its interaction with the spirit of East London today.

New Beginnings

SoCo Music Project – New beginnings was about bringing to life stories from the Southampton Black History audio archive. We worked with Southampton’s City Archives to access the Black History recordings and engage with young people, using the recordings as a launchpad for a creative project, supporting the young people to reflect on, and respond to, those heritage stories. Young people used their own heritage stories and experiences to produce creative content. We ran creative sessions around music, lyrics, poetry, art and film to support the production of creative responses.

Watch the highlights video here

Sounds Oft’Dales

Members of BlueBoxt Productions‘s Play>Record>Perform Project have been working on a creative heritage challenge. They have explored what is important about the people and places where they live and shared their discoveries about Wensleydale through Music, Spoken Word and Images. This is the first time creating new compositions, made more challenging because we have only been able to work remotely via Zoom. Find out more at www.blueboxt.co.uk and click on Play>Record>Perform.

From the Roots

Steaming Beats engaged young people from the local estates of Handsworth with music, photography, film and heritage. Provided with the tools to compose their own works. We zoomed for 8 sessions which on topics including music composition, heritage photography, and film workshops. Xhosa Cole, BBC Young Jazz Musician of the Year 2018 and Handsworth resident, let us take inspiration from modern-day and historical surroundings to create our own music.

Our video ‘Handsworth Song’ is a culmination of our sound bricks made on Bandlab, compiled by Xhosa Cole, with the accompanying photos that inspired the music.

Carefree project drawings hanging in a virtual gallery

Maps That Matters

Maps that Matter ran over 2 months in Autumn 2020. Throughout the project, we explored what the word ‘heritage’ really meant to us. While visiting museums and engaging with digital collections they tapped into Cornwall’s maritime history with a particular focus on maps, journeys, navigation and direction. Inspired by what we discovered in the collections we engaged in a full day of ‘making’ with a professional artist. We created artwork and installations which explored personal journeys, creating a virtual exhibition which reflected the heritage they value, cherish and love.

Maps that Matter was a partnership project delivered by Carefree Cornwall and Cornwall Museums Partnership.

View the full Exhibition here

Our Mill On The Hill

Next Door Dance – worked with a team of young people to create a series of short films based around the history of the 100 year old Greens Windmill, that sits on the skyline of Nottingham City centre.

The films are based in and around the history and personal stories attached to Greens Windmill pre and post lockdown. The starting point for the participants was to look at the multiple lives the windmill has lived since its erection, from a traditional mill in the 1800’s, to a boot polish manufacturer in the 1920’s, back to its original purpose (and most heroic role) of helping feed the nation in 2020.

Chit Chat Whit

Urban Wilderness – The Chit Chat Whit project enabled young people living in the shadow of an abandoned coal mine to explore what heritage means to them. Taking part in creative photography workshops in the nature reserve surrounding Chatterley Whitfield Colliery. We shared stories of ghosts, adventure and escape which was developed into an audio story and atmospheric slideshow. Taking part changed the way some of us felt about ourselves and where we live.

We are working with Sound Connections, one of our amazing consortium partners to deliver this programme.

Find out more about them on our Partners page

Sound Connections