Punch is looking for a resourceful and creative new Project Co-ordinator.

Salary range £18k – £20k

What we’re looking for:

At an exciting juncture of the organisation’s development, we are looking for a Project Co-ordinator to build on our innovative education and projects programme and take our digital communications to the next level.

The Project Co-ordinator will be responsible for Punch’s project based work, taking a lead from its inception, through planning and co-ordination to evaluation. This exciting and fast moving role will include organising one off events, bespoke training and workshop programmes, community projects and commissions throughout the year and as part of the annual BASS Festival.

We expect the post-holder to have experience of working on education or events projects within a community or young person focussed environment.

For a full job description and application please click on the links below.

Job Description

Application Form

Closing date: noon on Monday 19^th July 2010

Interview Date: Monday 2^nd August 2010

For further information about the role, please email: ammo (at) punch-records.co.uk

Punch touring is proud to announce the UK tour by a real legend of African music. Tony Allen will be marking his 70th birthday and the 50th anniversary of Nigerian independence with a UK tour this autumn. Kicking off at the mac (Midlands Art Centre)  in Birmingham, the five date tour with his full afrobeat orchestra will play in Leeds, London, Edinburgh, Bristol and Glasgow. Tony Allen, who played at the WOMAD festival in Charlton Park on 23 July 2010, will be promoting his CD Secret Agent and playing a special showcase at London’s Barbican. This will be the third tour produced through Black Routes, the network for touring African and Caribbean music.

Full 2010 tour dates are:
30 September, Birmingham mac

1 October, Glasgow The Aches

2 October, Edinburgh HMV Picture House

3 October, Leeds Wardrobe

6 October, London Barbican Centre

7 October, Bristol Metropolis

Tony Allen’s track Asiko was heavily sampled by J Dilla. Check out the clip below:

Born in August 1940, and a self-taught musician, Tony Allen began to play at the age of eighteen, a fan of American jazz but also fascinated by traditional music and with the percussion work of Ghanaian Guy Warren, who mixed traditional rhythms with the new sounds of American bebop. Invited to audition for a jazz-highlife band by Fela Kuti in 1964, he became an original member of Kuti’s Koola Lobitos highlife-jazz band and started a decades-long musical relationship.

Allen is known as the man who put the beat in Afrobeat, Nigeria’s most influential musical export – a combination of the heavy groove and universal appeal of soul with jazz, highlife, and the polyrhythms of Yoruba music. Allen’s fusion of drum styles perfectly complemented Fela’s new African groove and he recorded over 30 albums with Fela and Africa ’70 – widely regarded as Fela’s best works. He has also worked with Manu Dibango, King Sunny Ade and Ray Lema. While often returning to the Afrobeat template that made his name, in the years since Allen has also worked with a broad range of rock acts, such as Jimi Tenor,  and, to general acclaim, with Damon Albarn, Paul Simonon as the group The Good, The Bad and the Queen.

Punch in partnership with Lozells Recreation Group have recently completed a young people’s participation project called Music is my Heritage and we are thrilled to announce that 9 young people have all achieved their Bronze Arts Award.

The 16 week project explored the rich and diverse musical history of North West Birmingham and each week participants worked with a professional, local musician to workshop different genres of music.

The group explored the genres of grime, hip hop, reggae, bashment, bhangra and MC and lyric writing. They have produced their own short film of the project and even created their own soundtrack! Check out the footage by clicking here.

The group worked towards achieving their Arts Award qualification by capturing the project through film. They used handheld FLIP cameras to film each other during the activities and then worked with a professional film-maker to edit the footage. This footage, along with their project folders, was shown to the Arts Award Assessor who passed all the group with flying colours. The assessor commented that “the young people worked enthusiastically and become really involved in the project. Very well done”.

This is a fantastic achievement for Punch and LRG but mostly for all the young people who worked so hard throughout the project – many congratulations to each of them, they are now the very proud owners of a Bronze Arts Award certificate.

Have a look at some of the pictures taken from the various sessions below:

This special event as part of BASS 2010 was presented in partnership with the mac, Edge 10, UK Vibe and Liquid Fusion.

There was a screening of the film The Jazz Room, followed by a Q and A and dancing workshops accompanied by DJ Bruce Q.

Below is a slideshow of photos from the event, taken by Damian Brown Photography.

We chose to open the festival with our Protest: Fight the Power exhibition at the newly opening Zellig building, Custard Factory.

If you have feedback or content to add to the exhibition then please join our Facebook page by clicking here.

The exhibition is open until the end of June, Monday – Saturday 10am – 5pm and it is FREE. 

Below are some of the highlights of the launch night:

Photographs by Damian Brown Photography.

Massive thanks to all those who showed support for the event.

Below is a slideshow of photographs from the day and you can also watch a video capturing some of the highlights of the event.

Check out the slideshow of the photographs from the Bhangra Flashmob taken by Jaskirt Dhaliwal.

Part of the four day challenge Verma will embark on a 120 mile journey from London’s BBC Centre on 22nd May 2010 to The Mailbox, Birmingham arriving ahead of the public consultation closure 25th May 2010. His protest journey will start on the day of the world’s first ever Bhangra Flashmob! For more details on the Flashmob,click here.

Verma thought of the idea of walking backwards after hearing about Lotan Baba, Indian’s famous ‘Rolling Saint’ who has rolled over 18,000 miles across India in a bid for unity and peace. His belief in penance and the backwards step for BBC’s decision to close BBC Asian Network and 6 Music encouraged Verma to devise this challenge.

Through this Verma hopes to build support for the campaign to ’save BBC Asian Network and 6 Music’.

For more information call Punch on 0121 224 7444.

Check out the short clip added when Punch hit the Birmingham Vaisakhi Mela 2010, click here.

JAH SHAKA KING OF DUB – JAH SHAKA ZULU WARRIOR

Rainbow Warehouse 10pm-4am Saturday 25th June 2010.

This exclusive event will be Roots Rock Reggae Music at it’s finest with the spiritual messenger JAH SHAKA at the controls in an all night session.

JAH SHAKA is the King of Dub – a  Producer, Selector, Chanter, Messenger and phenomenol Vocal Artist.

With over 35 years in the business Shaka’s message is coming to Birmingham!

Early bird tickets £10, regular price £13.50 (more on the door)

Tickets available from Hatman and Summit and also from TheTicketSellers – 0844 870 0000.

Check out the footage below of Shaka performing live in Birmingham back in 2004:

You can read our brochure online by clicking on the image below and we’ll also be distributing hard copies around the city very soon.

The World’s first ever and biggest BHANGRA FLASHMOB is here to help support the campaign to save the BBC Asian Network and British Asian music.

Date: 22nd May 2010

Time: 1pm

Location: Central London, TBC

RSVP to the facebook group page and join the World’s 1st and biggest BHANGRA FLASHMOB – to save Asian Network, click here.

UPDATE  on 21st May 2010:

Due to overwhelming support a second flashmob event will take place Victoria Sqaure, Birmingham from 12.30 noon.

 Check out Punch’s short clip of Bhangra stars signing up to the World’s first ever Bhangra Flashmob:

Check out the short clip added when Punch hit the Birmingham Vaisakhi Mela 2010, click here.