Migration Matters Festival Returns With Grammy Nominee Headliners

By Tchiyiwe Chihana
Migration Matters Festival will return to Sheffield from 14th to 22nd June with Grammy nominees as headliners. The UK’s biggest Refugee Week event has attracted growing audiences and bigger artists year on year.

This year, the programme boasts of Grammy-nominated husband-and-wife musical duo, Amadou & Mariam of Mali, who performed their Afrobeat hits at Glastonbury last year and previously performed for President Barack Obama. "MigMat," as it is fondly called, will also host genre-hopping Swiss band Sirens of Lesbos and prize-winning poet Roger Robinson among the prominent performers confirmed so far.

Local celebrities to look out for include the former poet laureate of Sheffield, hip hop and spoken word artist Otis Mensah. They have joined the line-up of guest curators with their programme, “Longerr Inheritances” which will look at jazz experimentation and what it means to cross genres and artistic expectations as Black artists and artists of colour.

Tchiyiwe Chihana spoke to Ellen Beardmore, Marketing and Communications Manager of the festival about the programme, ticketing and themes this year. *Ticket sales have opened and available on the Migration Matters Festival website.