Events, Recent & Forthcoming
Simon Armitage’s live poetry readings for the general public or his live performances with the band LYR are added regularly to the listings below when ticket sales have been announced. Broadcasts still available are also listed below. For schools, GCSE Poetry Live! listings are available here.
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Tues, May 13, 7.30pm – Dwell : Simon Armitage at the Palmerston Room, St John’s College, Cambridge CB3 0AF. Tickets on sale. Going fast
Tues, May 27, 7.30pm – An Evening with Simon Armitage, presented by Derby Book Festival for their 10th anniversary. Derby Theatre, DE1 2NF. Tickets on sale, please register online with the theatre or call the Box Office 01332 59 39 39
Fri, May 30, 7.00 pm – Poems for Life Gala, Global Stage, Hay Festival, Hay-on-Wye. Tickets on sale.
Sat, May 31, 1.00pm – Dwell, Wye Stage, Hay Festival, Hay-on-Wye. Tickets on sale.
Tues, June 10, 9.20pm – International Poetry Festival of Genoa, Palazzo Ducale – Cortile Maggiore, Genoa, Italy.
June 12-15, Poetry International Festival: Laureates and Legends, Rotterdam, The Netherlands. Tickets on sale.
Sat, June 21, doors open at 6.00pm – A Passion for Poetry: An evening with Simon Armitage, Poet Laureate, and Pascale Petit, Heligan Homecoming Festival, The Lost Gardens of Heligan, Pentewan, St.Austell, Cornwall, PL26 6EN. Tickets on sale.
Fri, June 27, 7.30pm– An Evening with Simon Armitage: Blossomise, Streat Parish Church, Åland Islands, BN6 8RU. Sold out
Sat, July 5, 8.00pm – Dwell at Ledbury Poetry Festival, Community Hall, Ledbury, Herefordshire HR8 2AE. Tickets on sale.
Mon, July 14, 7.30pm – An Evening with Simon Armitage, New Theatre Royal Portsmouth, PO1 2DD. Tickets on sale.
Fri, July 18, 7.00pm – Simon Armitage & LYR with Easington Colliery Brass Band present “Firm As A Rock We Stand”. This special performance will be held at Redhills Miners’ Hall, also known as The Pitmans’ Parliament, and recorded for BBC Radio 4’s The Verb. The event will include poetry performances presented by Ian McMillan. Tickets on sale. Last few tickets.
Fri, Aug 8, 9.00pm – Proms 2025: 100 Years of the Shipping Forecast. The Proms celebrates the centenary of the Shipping Forecast with presenters from Radio 4’s Continuity team, music inspired by the oceans and the elements, and a new work by Poet Laureate Simon Armitage and his group LYR. Ulster Hall, 34 Bedford St, Belfast BT2 7FF. Booking opens on May 17.
Sun, Aug 10, 2.00pm – Simon Armitage at Church Stretton Arts Festival, St Laurence’s Church, Church Stretton, Shropshire SY6 6DQ – Tickets on sale May 31 – please check the link.
Sun, Aug 24 – time ba – Simon Armitage at Krankenhaus 2025, 5th anniversary festival at Muncaster Castle, Near Ravenglass, Cumbria, UK, CA18 1RQ. Tickets on sale.
Mon, Sept 29, 7.00pm – An Evening with Simon Armitage, Topping & Company Booksellers of Bath, York Street, Bath, Somerset BA1 1NG. Tickets on sale.
Tues, Sept 30, 8.00pm – Cabaret Voltaire: Simon Armitage in Bruton, St. Mary’s Church, Bruton, Somerset, BA10 0EB. Tickets on sale.
Wed, Oct 1, 8.00pm – Simon Armitage in Lyme Regis, Marine Theatre, Lyme Regis, Dorset DT7 3QB. Tickets on sale.
Thurs, Oct 2, 8.00pm – Cabaret Voltaire: Simon Armitage in Totnes, The Civic Hall, Totnes, Devon TQ9 5SF. Tickets on sale.
Fri, Oct 3, 8.00pm – Cabaret Voltaire: Simon Armitage in Falmouth, King Charles the Martyr Church, Falmouth TR11 3DX. Tickets on sale.
Sat, Oct 4, 8.00pm – North Coast Arts presents Simon Armitage, Parkhouse Centre, Bude, EX23 8LD. Tickets on sale.
Broadcasts still available
BBC Radio 4, My Poetry and Other Animals (2024)
The Poet Laureate Simon Armitage meets ten different animals (he makes eye contact with a tiger, holds a giant African land snail in the palm of his hand, stands in the middle of a room full of spiders, and tracks a fox) as he drafts a brand new poem across this series. Simon’s written a lot about animals in the past, but always at a distance. He wants that to change, and to feel that he has captured the spirit of an animal, and done it justice. Across different creaturely encounters, meetings with poets, and some of the most vivid poems about animals ever written (including Ted Hughes’ The Thought-Fox, William Blake’s The Tyger, Sharon Olds’ The Connoisseuse of Slugs, and Imtiaz Dharker’s The Host) Simon asks whether a poem can bring an animal closer to us, and if poetry can help us grasp what other animals really mean to our species, in an age when so many species are under threat.
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.