18-year-old Eve’s journey through Jack Drum Drum climaxes in the coming together of her two passions: samba drumming and climate activism, ahead of beginning her studies in Climate Science at Durham University.

Eve first encountered Jack Drum Arts in 2013, where she performed with her school choir at St John’s Secondary School in Crook Winter Light Parade, recalling wearing a white flurry cape, blue lips and blue glitter, and that it was “incredible”.

She went on to join Jackass Youth Theatre for around 2 years, and performed in 3 performances including ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’ at Hamsterley Forest; a story inspired by the Great War.

At a similar time, Eve volunteered at Jack Drum Arts’ Youth Cafe in Crook through her Duke of Edinburgh bronze and silver awards, where she described herself as being shy and “uncomfortable at leading”.

In September 2018, Eve and her Mum Emma took part in a samba drumming course by Jack Drum Arts in Durham, which inspired them to join Runaway Samba in Crook on a Thursday evening.

Since then, they have both joined Baque de Ogum and Nordestinos, and Eve has began leading Jack Drum Arts’ youth samba drumming group Get Set Samba.

Empowering Eve as a Young Leader

As a young leader, Eve was encouraged by Jack Drum Arts to apply for Global Grooves’ Future Leaders Programme, which involved attended 4 intensive weekend residentials across 2021 and 2022. These were Eve’s first solo trips without her parents, which she described as being "an incredible experience, and has definitely helped with my skills in leading at Jack Drum.”

In Summer 2021, Eve and a group of young leaders performed around 30 doorstep gigs across the North East with Runaway Samba. She described it as “insane, and exhausting” and said “I know a lot of people had a really hard time in Covid, and I remember coming away from thinking I’ve had a brilliant time and spent it with some amazing people, and I’ve been able to drum for some amazing people.”

B.O.P Fest

In 2021, Eve became a member of Jack Drum Arts’ Youth Board, who were invited to take part in a range of activities around climate activism with facilitators such as climate activist, Abel Harvie Clark and co founder of the May Project Gardens, Ian Solomon Kawall.

Following this, the Youth Board began to develop ideas for a ‘green’ festival, supported by Hannabiell Sanders and Yilis del Carmen Suriel, Directors of Harambee Pasadia Afro Fusion Arts Festival.

Eve said that they were encouraged to dream; “at one point we were having Green Day and ABBA, bouncy castles, water features, everything!”

From here, they had regular meetings with Yilis, who provided organisational support as well as more practical support such as sewing handles onto the B.O.P Fest backdrop and donating leftover Harambee Pasadia wristbands.

Eve said: “They were great working with the team, and the energy that they bring was so fun.”

Eve studied biology, chemistry and geography at Durham Johnston Sixth Form, and completed an EPQ in Cop 26 and the Climate Crisis, which has fed directly into her role in producing B.O.P Fest.

B.O.P Fest took place on 14th August 2022 at Glenholme Park in Crook.

Eve described it as “incredible”:

“We had over 2000 people there, our food vendors sold out […] I remember being on the walkie talkie going ‘we need more paper for our graffiti art workshop', it was non stop all day, everything turned up, all the stages were really pretty, all the bands had a lovely time, it ran really smoothly the entire day.”

“It exceeded all my expectations”

Eve’s role on the day was Artist Liaison, and she took on a Manager role alongside Youth Arts Worker Mike Daynes having contacted the workshop facilitators, artists, and street performers prior to the festival.

“My favourite part was just chatting to people, it was great.”

“I definitely want to do it again.”

Eve is excited to begin thinking about next year, expanding B.O.P Fest by applying the learning from this year to “let it grow”.

But first, Eve will begin her studies at Durham University in September 2022, and shared:

“It’s quite daunting because it is a big next step but […] I think I’ve picked the right course.”

“Doing B.O.P Fest made me realise that this is what I want to do. I want to work with people. I want to create events. I want to make things more sustainable like through the process, so I think I will go into event production and trying to make festivals more sustainable.”

One of her main draws to a local university is her commitment to Jack Drum Arts, where she will continue to engage with Runaway Samba, Get Set Samba and Baque de Ogum, whilst drawing upon the learning from her course in Climate Science to feed into the next B.O.P Fest in 2023.