Events, Recent & Forthcoming
Live events for Simon Armitage’s poetry readings or his performances with LYR are added regularly once ticket sales have been announced. Broadcasts still available are also listed below.
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Tues, Sept 10, 7.30pm – An Evening with Simon Armitage, for the Wordsworth Trust. St Oswald’s Church, Church Stile, Grasmere, Ambleside, LA22 9SW Tickets on sale. Sold out, but wait list available.
Fri, Sept 21, 6.30pm – LYR at Braemar Literary Festival, Braemar Village Hall, Ballater AB35 5RF Tickets on sale.
Sat, Sept 22, 11.30am – Simon Armitage in conversation with Nick Barley, Braemar Literary Festival, Ballater AB35 5RF Tickets on sale.
Wed, Sept 25, 8.00pm – Cabaret Voltaire: Simon Armitage – St Marys Church, Bruton, Somerset, BA10 0EB. Tickets on sale. Sold out.
Thurs, Sept 26, 8.00pm – Cabaret Voltaire: Simon Armitage – St Mary’s Church, Totnes, Devon, TQ9 5NN. Tickets on sale. Sold out.
Fri, Sept 27, 7.30pm – LYR at North Cornwall Book Festival, St Endellion Church, Port Isaac, PL29 3TP. Tickets on sale.
Sat, Sept 28, 1.00pm – Simon Armitage at North Cornwall Book Festival, St Endellion Church, Port Isaac, PL29 3TP. Tickets on sale. Sold out.
Sat, Sept 28, 7.30pm – Dome Sessions: LYR, Market Hall, Plymouth, PL1 4PS. Tickets on sale. Sold out.
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Thurs, Oct 10, 8.00pm – An Evening with Poet Laureate Simon Armitage, hosted by Autumn in Malvern Festival and Malvern Theatres, Great Malvern, WR14 3HB. Simon Armitage introduces and reads a selection of his own poems. He also includes Robert Frost’s Iris by Night marking the 150th Anniversary of Frost’s birth. Tickets on sale.
Sun, Oct 13, 4.00pm – Simon Armitage in Conversation with Julia Wheeler, Cheltenham Literature Festival, The Parabola Arts Centre Cheltenham Ladies’ College, GL50 3EP. Tickets on sale. Sold out.
Oct 16-17 – Simon Armitage, Poet Laureate, visita Madrid con AVIÓN DE PAPEL. Simon Armitage, Poeta Laureado y Comandante de la Orden del Imperio Británico, presenta por primera vez en español Avión de papel, sus poemas reunidos de 1989 a 2014. Le acompaña Jordi Doce, el traductor en la Librería Alberti el 16 de octubre a las 19:00.
Y al día siguiente, día 17 de octubre, os invitamos al té de las 5 de la librería Amapolas en Octubre acompañados del Poeta Laureado, Comandante de la Orden del Imperio Británico, Simon Armitage y Elena Medel, presentarán Avión de papel, sus poemas reunidos de 1989 a 2014.
Sat-Sun, Oct 19-20 – Summit, a two-day festival of eco-poetry, nature and climate writing in West Yorkshire. Saturday at Yorkshire Sculpture Park includes workshops, readings and features the Prize-giving Ceremony for the Poet Laureate’s international Laurel Prize for eco-poetry (5.30pm BST, Sat Oct 19). The Prize-giving Ceremony is due to be live-streamed. Please email administration@poetryschool.com to register your interest for the live stream. Sunday’s events will take place at the University of Leeds Poetry Centre and include an Introductory Climate Summit and a reading by Simon Armitage. Tickets for Summit will be released via the Poetry School and Yorkshire Sculpture Park websites on Mon, Sept 2.
Thurs, Oct 24, 8.00pm – Simon Armitage: Blossomise, Yeovil Literary Festival, BA20 2DD. Tickets on sale.
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Sun, Nov 10, 3.00pm – Songs and Poems of Remembrance, Nicholas Watts (Tenor) and Simon Armitage hosted by Ripon Concerts Society, Holy Trinity Church, Ripon, HG4 2EY. Tickets on sale.
Nov 29 – Jan 5 – Hansel and Gretel, Shakespeare’s Globe, London SE1 9DT. A new version of The Brothers Grimm’s fairy tale by Poet Laureate Simon Armitage, directed by Nick Bagnall. Tickets on sale.
Tues, Dec 10, 7.45pm – Simon Armitage Candlelit Poetry Reading, Stapleford Granary, nr Cambridge, CB22 5BP. Tickets on sale. Last few tickets remaining.
Wed, Dec 15, 4.00pm – Hansel & Gretel: Simon Armitage in Conversation, part of The Globe Talks series, Sam Wanamaker Theatre, London SE1 9DT
2025
Wed, Jan 22, 8.00pm – LYR at Brewery Arts, Kendal LA9 4HE Tickets on sale.
Thurs, Jan 23, 8.00pm – LYR at the Music Room, Liverpool Philharmonic Hall, L1 9BP Tickets on sale.
Fri, Jan 24, 7.30pm – An Evening with Simon Armitage and LYR, A unique evening of poetry and then music. York Theatre Royal, YO1 7HD. Tickets on sale.
Sat, Jan 25, 7.00pm – LIVE @ THE BIG TOP – LYR, Ayrshire Athletics Arena, Kilmarnock, KA1 3XF. Tickets on sale.
Sun, Jan 26, 8.00pm – LYR at Trades Club, Hebden Bridge, W. Yorks HX7 8EE Tickets on sale.
Broadcasts still available
BBC Radio 4, Larkin Revisited. Across ten programmes and ten Philip Larkin poems, Simon Armitage finds out what happens when he revisits and unpicks Larkin’s work in Larkin’s centenary year (2022).
BBC Radio 4, The Poet Laureate has Gone to his Shed in which the Poet Laureate Simon Armitage talks to guests about life, language and music in his shed.
BBC Radio 4,The Ballad of Eldon Street – an unnatural history. A new form of radio ballad to mark the centenary of Radio Drama on the BBC. The story of this iconic Barnsley street told by the people who know it best, interwoven with specially composed songs written by LYR – Simon Armitage, Patrick J Pearson and Richard Walters.
BBC Radio 4, Poet Laureate in the Arctic. Considering himself a nature poet and with a geography degree, Simon Armitage pledged to put the environment at the heart of his thinking when he became Poet Laureate in 2019. In this 2023 series he travels to The Arctic to see for himself what’s going on in this part of the world which is so crucial to the climate change debate.