The Arts Hour Edinburgh Festivals Special

Available for over a year

This week’s The Arts Hour is dedicated to some of the global artists taking part in this year’s Edinburgh Festivals. Scotland’s capital city hosts the biggest arts festival in the world. It was cancelled for the first time in its history in 2020 due to the pandemic but now it’s back, albeit as a smaller affair, with only a few tourists and none of the young hopefuls thrusting flyers into your hands along the Royal Mile trying to persuade you to see their show. However there were still over a thousand events happening live and online and organisers have had to be inventive when it comes to the venues, which this year include the top of a car park, a beach and inside a football stadium. Nikki Bedi talks to film and photographic artist Isaac Julien about his work Lessons of the Hour, about the great African American writer, orator, abolitionist and freed slave Frederick Douglass. Malian musician Fatoumata Diawara tells us why she’s giving voice to the voiceless in her songs. US performer and playwright Apphia Campbell remembers her first experience of performing at the Edinburgh Fringe. Fatma Said explains why it’s a responsibility being an Egyptian opera singer. Choreographers Alice Ripoll from Brazil and Omar Rajeh from Lebanon tell us about the dance films they’ve made for the Edinburgh International Festival. Nigerian sound artist Emeka Ogboh on why the song Auld Lang Syne and the UK leaving the European Union were the inspirations behind his latest work, Song of the Union And music from the Orkney based Scottish folk group Fara. Producer: Andrea Kidd (Image: Isaac Julien. Credit: Duncan McGlynn)