Alexandra Burke to headline Channel Islands Pride in Jersey
UK performers Rhumba Club, DJ Woody Cook and drag stars Mercedes Bends, Paige Three and Sophia Stardust will be in attendance alongside local drag artists, the Jersey LGBTQ+ choir and artists Shea, Kingsy and disco-funk band Brick House.Organisers said: "Alexandra's headline set will cap off a day of community celebration, world-class entertainment, and bold visibility for the LGBTQ+ community and allies alike."
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ITV News
an hour ago
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Tens of thousands of people are expected to march through Liverpool to celebrate Pride after celebrations were almost cancelled due to financial pressures. The annual celebrations had originally been called off for 2025, due to rising costs and difficulty securing funding, but it was saved when the region's LGBTQ+ and HIV charity Sahir House stepped in to run the event. Now called Liverpool's Pride, organisers say they "are pulling out all the stops" to uplift often marginalised members of the queer community, like Trans people, refugees, and those living with disabilities. What is the history behind Liverpool Pride? Liverpool's first official Pride event was held the weekend of 7 August 2010. It typically takes place at the end of July or early August to commemorate the death of Michael Causer, an 18-year-old gay man who was murdered in Liverpool. Michael died in hospital after he was seriously assaulted at a house party on 25 July 2008. His family, who set up a foundation in his name to help other young LGBTQ+ people, say he was killed because of his sexual orientation. When is this year's new Pride event taking place in Liverpool? Liverpool's Pride is taking place on Saturday 26 July. What is the new route for Liverpool's Pride march? The event, which has previously taken place at St George's Hall, will start at the city's Pier Head for the first time. Local LGBTQ+ activists and community voices will lead speeches from 10.30am at Pier Head before the parade at 11.30am. The route will begin from Three Graces at the city's waterfront, along Strand Street and Salthouse Quay at the Albert Dock before ending at the M&S Bank Arena where a ticketed event will take place at noon. The 2025 march will be led by trans rights group Protect Scouse Dolls, followed by Block One – the only designated marching block, created specifically for LGBTQ+ people living with disabilities and neurodivergent LGBTQ+ people. Organisers say they will "set the pace" for the rest of the march, "helping to create a calmer, more accessible experience for everyone". Liverpool Pride say the new route has been designed to be shorter, step-free and wheelchair friendly to ensure the everybody can enjoy the parade. Is anything happening after the march? The march concludes at the M&S Bank Arena, leading straight into a main celebration event - a vibrant afternoon of LGBTQ+ joy, creativity, and community. Four hours of live performances are scheduled to take place by a wide variety of "incredible" local LGBTQ+ performers The event will also feature a community marketplace with around 40 stalls including charities, queer makers, food, drink, and services The inclusive event is for everyone who marched with Pride – and for those cheering us on from the side-lines - with tickets costing £5.50. Why did LCR Pride cancel the 2025 event and how was it saved? The LCR Pride Foundation, the charity behind the annual March with Pride, announced in June that the event was cancelled due to 'significant financial and organisational challenges'. Organisers said it had become impossible to deliver the event, which had been scheduled for Saturday 26 July, due to rising costs and a struggle to secure both local and national funding. It added that reverting to "a mainly volunteer-led model" and tight planning timescales also played a major part. But a month after the announcement, Sahir House, the city's oldest LGBTQ+ charity, shared on social media that they had 'turned things around' and Pride was back on. The charity said in a statement on its website: 'This year, we're proudly calling it Liverpool's Pride – with an apostrophe and an 's' – because this Pride belongs to all of us.
Daily Record
3 hours ago
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The Guardian
a day ago
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On stage at Nashville Pride festival on a sweltering June afternoon, Big Freedia is her usual boisterously commanding self. She invites volunteers and the sign-language interpreter to join her and her dancers in getting down to bounce music, the relentlessly kinetic style of hip-hop for which she has become a figurehead in her native New Orleans. Then she pauses for a brief heart-to-heart with the audience. 'I don't know if y'all know this, but I started in the church,' she says. Big Freedia's forthcoming album, Pressing Onward, is a gospel record and she is keen to stress that she isn't abandoning her core audience. The gay, gender-fluid rapper and reality TV star exhorts every kind of body to shake it and is unequivocal about her support for all marginalised people; her reputation led Beyoncé and Drake to sample her on some of their most successful tracks. 'This album is for us,' she emphasises. 'It is for people who are LGBTQ and who love God.' 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'It demonstrates to the church: your excluding of us doesn't have to be the end of our story; we find community with one another in ways that you both taught us how to do and in ways you could not anticipate. So perhaps you should pay more attention to the very thing that you have excluded.' Big Freedia initially planned to release Pressing Onward in June's Pride month, but in May her longtime partner, Devon Hurst, died unexpectedly of diabetes complications. She insisted on directing the choir at his funeral. The day before our interview, she closed on the house they had planned to buy together. 'My whole life has just changed within this last month,' she says. 'It has been an emotional rollercoaster, all the things that me and him had planned and the things we were doing and working on. And now I'm doing all these things by myself.' Even in her profound grief, she was willing to push the album release back only by a month. 'I need it more than anybody,' she says. 'And I know if I need it, there's other people out there in the world that need it. There's always someone who's depressed or going through a hard time. There is always someone who's fighting who they are, or fighting against a community of people that don't accept who they are. This album is not just for me – it's for the world.' Pressing Onward is released via Queen Diva Music on 8 August
