Ready to Roam?

A creative project addressing some of the enduring impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic will get underway in Cork’s northside this weekend.

Roam, a Cork City Council-led arts initiative, will mark five years since the beginning of the pandemic with an incredible programme of gigs, exhibitions, workshops, and events running up until the summer across Cork city’s northside.

Its aim is to encourage people to enjoy their post-pandemic freedom to wander, explore, experiment, and be curious.

A spokesperson for the project said: “Cork City Council teams recognised that in our school communities, some young people are missing age-related development targets, while some older adults continue to remain cocooned.”

Roam is supported by the Creative Ireland Programme under its Health and Wellbeing pillar in collaboration with the Irish Hospice Foundation’s Arts and Cultural Engagement programme. The programme was founded in the pandemic with an aim to develop a unique body of work using creativity of all kinds to reduce the impact of bereavement, loss, and grief.

The project starts with a fanfare this Saturday from 7-9pm in the Firkin Crane. The event will see local groups Music Generation Cork City, Musical Neighbourhoods, and The Kabin Studio, collaborate with Scottish community orchestra, Tinderbox Collective. Tinderbox Collective is an eclectic 21-piece group of rappers, singers, brass, strings, and woodwind musicians, backed by a powerful rhythm section.

Having already made music together online, the groups will meet in person for the first time over Valentine’s weekend, something organisers are calling “a reversing of pandemic isolation”.

Tickets for the fanfare can be booked online at dancecorkfirkincrane.ie.

Some of the groups involved in the project include Barnardos, Blackpool Community Centre, Cork Simon Community, Dance Cork Firkin Crane, Hollyhill Library, HSE Community Health Teams, Let’s Grow Together, and Cork City Partnership Friendly Call Programme.