Image credit - Mark Savage

A live performance combining spoken word and music, sharing stories from real people across the city. Expect honesty, humour and heart.

Dear Sunderland is a powerful live performance bringing together spoken word and music to share stories from across the city. From children to elders, lifelong residents to new arrivals, this event celebrates the voices, memories and experiences that shape Sunderland today.

Expect surprising connections, differences of opinion, moments of pure joy and flashes of deep frustration (and yes, that includes the football). Above all, expect honesty, humour and heart.

Created with and inspired by people from across the city, Dear Sunderland is a celebration of community in all its complexity – the stories we carry, the places we love, and the conversations that bring us closer together.

Come along, listen in, and see Sunderland through someone else’s eyes.

Created by Unfolding Theatre, commissioned by The Cultural Spring.

Directed by Annie Rigby · Written by Ray Hopkins, Annie Rigby & Midge Ryall · Music by Ray Hopkins & A Band Like This · Story Collectors: Ray Hopkins, Joy Omotade & James Williams · Produced by Midge Ryall.

With enormous thanks to everyone who wrote letters at CFO Sunderland, Sunderland MIND, Sunderland Student Union, A Band Like This, Creative Sparks Culture Start Group in Sulgrave, Winnibell Family Hub, Friends of the Drop-In at Space 4 in Houghton-le-Spring and everyone who sent a letter online.

Funding for the Community Cohesion project has come from Sunderland City Council and the UK government through the Community Renewal Fund, and through Arts Council England’s Creative People and Places funding.