Page to Stage: Voicing your verses feat. Cadence Weapon & Sadiqa de Meijer

Event Details

Event type: All Ages

This workshop will feature rapper Cadence Weapon (aka Rollie Pemberton, former Edmonton Poet Laureate), Kingston's Poet Laureate Sadiqa de Meijer and local vocalist, poet and spoken word artist J-Marsh (aka Jermaine Marshall). In this workshop, all three artists will discuss how they develop and use their verse - from writing poems to developing lyrics and flowing between genres. This free event encourages everyone with a creative spark to get writing without worrying about 'doing it wrong'.

***

Cadence Weapon (Rollie Pemberton) is Edmonton-born, Hamilton-based rapper, producer, writer and poet Rollie Pemberton. His 2021 album Parallel World won Canada’s Polaris Music Prize. The son of a pioneering hip-hop radio DJ, Pemberton grew up around a diverse library of music. Splitting his time between Edmonton’s experimental electronic and underground rap scenes as a teenager, Pemberton eventually developed a hybrid of both styles. Cadence Weapon has released six albums, five of which have been nominated for the Polaris Music Prize, with Breaking Kayfabe (2006) and Hope In Dirt City (2012) and Parallel World (2021) being shortlist nominees. Pemberton has toured extensively following the success of these albums, playing festivals like Glastonbury, Lollapalooza, Pitchfork Music Festival, Roskilde and Primavera Sound and performing shows with artists such as Public Enemy, Diplo, Questlove, De La Soul and many more.

Pemberton’s music is known for pairing groundbreaking production with incisive, socially conscious lyricism. Pemberton served as Poet Laureate of Edmonton from 2009 to 2011, making him the literary ambassador of his hometown. His poem “The Garden” was incorporated into a bronze sculpture at the Alberta Legislature Grounds in Edmonton in 2018. Pemberton was the narrator and a writer for the VICELAND television series PAYDAY and Mister Tachyon and he has hosted lectures and conducted live interviews for CBC q and Red Bull Music Academy. Pemberton’s memoir called Bedroom Rapper was published by McClelland & Stewart in May 2022 and his newest album ROLLERCOASTER was released on April 19, 2024.

Sadiqa de Meijer is an award-winning author, and poet - currently serving as Kingston Ontario’s Poet Laureate - whose book alfabet/alphabet: a memoir of a first language won the Governor General’s Award for English-language non-fiction in 2021. Born in Amsterdam and raised in Canada, Sadiqa explores the complexities of her identity as an immigrant across her writing in all its forms, describing “the sound of Dutch exists like a faint carbon shadow in my English,” on the topic of language in alfabet/alphabet. Her debut collection of poetry, Leaving Howe Island, was nominated for the Governor General’s Award for English-language poetry in 2014, and her writing has been published in numerous anthologies and literary magazines.

Jermaine Marshall aka J-Marsh is a proud queer Jamaican immigrant, artist and educator with a profound interest in facilitating meaningful and transformative intercultural encounters. After graduating with a Bachelor of Laws degree from the University of the West Indies and a Master of Arts in Social Justice and Equity Studies from Brock University, Jermaine worked passionately across the public and private sector in Canada to increase organizational capacities in responding to complex socio-legal issues and changing inter-cultural landscapes. He now serves as a policy advisor, educator and project manager at Queen’s University. As an artistic practitioner he is an active poet, vocalist and performer, a featured 2021 “artist of the city of St. Catharine’s” and the 2023 recipient of the city of Kingston Mayor’s Arts Champion Award. A storyteller at heart, his artistry pulls from a wealth of personal experience as he seeks to create a vibrant soundscape that captures the contours of lived pain, practiced joy and emergent hope within an oppressive society.

***
Next Church: 89 Colborne St, is wheelchair accessible via a ramp at the rear entrance of the building. We'll have a volunteer stationed at the front door to help guide anyone who requires ramp access.
From the park, Next Church is a 300m walk from Skeleton Park - head South through the park, turn right on York, turn left onto Barrie, and take Barrie up to Colborne and turn right.

***
This workshop is co-presented by the Kingston Music Office.