Out-Spoken: April

Out-Spoken is the Southbank Centre’s resident poetry and live music night, bringing the hottest UK and international poets to perform alongside world-class musicians every month. This month’s edition features poetry from Leyla Josephine, Dr Nick Makoha and Richard Scott.

Each monthly gig is hosted by TS Eliot- and Polari Prize-winning poet Taylor, with Sam ‘Junior’ Bromfield spinning the best in reggae, soul and R&B throughout the evening.

Leyla Josephine is a poet, film and theatre maker from Glasgow. Her first short film, Groom, was nominated for the Scottish BAFTA and the Critics Circle Award. Her poetry book In Public/In Private was released with Burning Eye Books, with the poem ‘Dear John Berger’ winning Best Single Poem Performed Forward Prize 2024. She was named as one of Screen International Rising Stars 2022. Her theatre show Daddy Drag was the winner of the 2019 Autopsy Award celebrating artists making ground-breaking work in Scotland.

Dr Nick Makoha is a Ugandan poet. His new collection is The New Carthaginians, published by Penguin UK. Winner of the 2021 Ivan Juritz Prize and the Poetry London Prize. In 2017, his debut collection, Kingdom of Gravity, was shortlisted for the Felix Dennis Prize for Best First Collection and was one of the Guardian’s best books of the year. He was the ICA 2023 Writer in Residence, and the 2019 Writer in Residence for The Wordsworth Trust and Wasafiri.

Richard Scott was born in London in 1981. His first book, Soho (2018) was a Gay’s the Word book of the year and was shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot prize. His second poetry collection, That Broke into Shining Crystals, was published by Faber & Faber in February 2025. He teaches poetry at the Faber Academy and is a lecturer in creative writing at Goldsmiths, University of London. He is a fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Presented in association with Out-Spoken.