The Traditional Dance Forum of Scotland announces full details of its third Pomegranates Festival programme that takes place in late April.
The Pomegranates Festival, supported by Creative Scotland’s Traditional Dance Target Fund, celebrates Scottish traditional dance and traditional dance practised by cultural migrant communities across Scotland. It provides a platform to showcase new dance commissions and residencies accompanied by live music, poetry and art. It invites audiences to participate in ceilidhs, workshops (both in person and live streamed)and has tours and talks about traditional dance from Scotland and around the world.
This year the festival’s choreographer in residence is MC, dancer, spoken word artist and director Jonzi D who is widely recognised for his influence on the development of the UK British hip hop dance and theatre scene. As choreographer in residence, Jonzi D will be working with 20 Edinburgh-based traditional dancers who will perform alongside him to showcase their work as part of the festival’s International Dance Day celebrations.
Over the festival weekend there will be a choice of curatorial tours of the exhibitions, as well as two specially-commissioned tours of Edinburgh’s Old and New Town’s dance history, looking at the under recognised female dance teachers of the past.
Before the festival kicks off, there will be a full day of Continuing Professional Development workshops on celebrating 12 different types of world traditional dance, from the South of Scotland to South Africa. The workshops are a key aspect of the ongoing festival partnership with the Moray House School of Education and Sport University of Edinburgh and will culminate with Jonzi’s keynote festival lecture on decolonising the expressive arts curriculum, which is open to all students, staff and the general public.
Festival Producer and Curator of the Traditional Dance Forum of Scotland, Iliyana Nedkova, said “It is so satisfying to see that the pomegranate ruby seeds of traditional dance that we planted for the first time in spring 2022, once again blossom into Scotland’s springtime festival for world trad dance. As a new festival born in times of uncertainty, displacement and border restrictions, we were inspired by a poem by Ian McMillan that captured the zeitgeist. Little did we know that Ian would become our first poet-in-residence. Three years on, we remain committed to this duet of poetry and pragmatism. I believe we are the only festival home for the diverse dance forms of the different migrant communities across Scotland from Indonesia and Ireland to Costa Rica and the Congo who all share the primary ingredient of world dance – the triple step.”
Initiated and produced by Traditional Dance Forum of Scotland, Pomegranates Festival is presented in partnership with Traditional Arts and Culture Scotland, Moray House School of Education and Sport, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh City Libraries, Dance Base and the Scottish Storytelling Centre.
Pomegranates will run from 25th-30th April 2024 at the Scottish Storytelling Centre and various venues across Edinburgh.
All festival events are presented on a ‘pay what you can‘ basis, while the exhibitions and the related hands-on traditional craft activities at Edinburgh’s Central Library are free and open to all.
For tickets and more information visit https://linktr.ee/pomegranatesfest
Irene Brown
Radio Summerhall Arts 