About this Event
Some musicians do more than make great music. They change the culture around them.
Five leading writers and cultural figures will each give a fifteen-minute talk on a musician who has deeply affected them, beginning with the music itself and opening out into the life, the cultural moment and the wider influence of the artist.
David Baddiel and Tim Hincks on David Bowie, not just as a musician but as a cultural force: the glamour, strangeness, intelligence and endless self-reinvention that made him so singular.
Sathnam Sanghera on George Michael: the songs, the voice, his extraordinary success and troubles, and the place he still holds in British culture.
Hadley Freeman on Madonna: the music, the image, the reinventions, the controversies, and the cultural force she became.
Ayishat Akanbi on Radiohead, whose music has continually pushed beyond alternative rock into electronic, experimental and orchestral territory.
John Harris on the Beatles, drawing on the months he spent immersed in their conversations, arguments, jokes and sudden moments of creative magic while editing the companion book to Peter Jackson’s Get Back.
Join us for an evening about great music, the people who made it, and the ways some artists come to shape the culture around them.
David Baddiel is a comedian, author, screenwriter and television presenter. He first came to prominence through The Mary Whitehouse Experience and Newman and Baddiel in Pieces, before creating and presenting Fantasy Football and Baddiel & Skinner Unplanned with Frank Skinner. With Skinner and The Lightning Seeds, he co-wrote the football anthem Three Lions. David is the author of the bestselling polemic Jews Don’t Count, which he later adapted into a Channel 4 documentary, as well as The God Desire.
Tim Hincks is one of the UK’s most successful television executives, with a 30-year career spanning some of the world’s best-known entertainment formats and award-winning dramas. As Co-CEO of Expectation, he oversees a wide range of scripted and non-scripted programmes, including Clarkson’s Farm, Alma’s Not Normal, The Chelsea Detective, The Change and David Baddiel: Cat Man. Tim is a regular commentator on the media, and also hosts a podcast about David Bowie with David Baddiel which absolutely no-one listens to.
Sathnam Sanghera is the author of several bestselling and award-winning works of fiction and non-fiction, including Empireland, which won the British Book Award for Narrative Non-Fiction and was made into a Channel 4 documentary, and Marriage Material, which was shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award and adapted for the stage in 2025. His memoir The Boy with the Topknot was shortlisted for the Costa Biography Award, won the Mind Book of the Year and was adapted for the BBC. His latest book is Tonight the Music Seems So Loud: The Meaning of George Michael.
Hadley Freeman is a columnist, features writer and the film critic at The Sunday Times. She worked for more than 20 years at The Guardian and her writing has appeared in many publications. Her most recent books, Good Girls: A story and study of anorexia, and House of Glass, were bestsellers and have been published around the world. Her next book, a biography of Nora Ephron, will be published later this year.
Ayishat Akanbi is a London-based fashion stylist and writer known for her ability to merge style with substance. She has styled a diverse range of artists across the music industry and worked with global fashion brands. As a cultural commentator, Ayishat explores the risks of ideological conformity and the importance of independent thought. Beyond examining the beliefs and ideas that curtail free thought and deepen polarisation, her work is equally interested in the art, ideas and experiences that enrich and enliven life.
John Harris is a multiple award-winning writer, journalist, podcaster and presenter. He has written professionally about music since he was 19, and is also known for his pioneering political and social writing, centred on his weekly column in The Guardian. His acclaimed books included The Last Party and Get Back, the authorised book that accompanied Peter Jackson's Beatles documentary series. His new memoir, Maybe I'm Amazed, explores creativity and neurodivergence, and tells the extraordinary story of how music opened up the world to his son.
Event venue & nearby stays
Royal Geographical Society, 1 Kensington Gore, London, United Kingdom
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