Culture of Bristol
Encyclopedia
Bristol
is a city
in South West England
. As the largest city in the region it is a centre for the arts and sport. The region has a distinct West Country
dialect
.
In summer the grounds of Ashton Court
to the west of the city play host to the Bristol International Balloon Fiesta
, a major event for hot air ballooning
in Britain. The Fiesta draws a substantial crowd even for the early morning lift that typically begins at about 6.30 am. Events and a fairground entertain the crowds during the day. A second mass ascent is then made in the early evening, again taking advantage of lower wind speeds.
The annual Bristol International Festival of Kites and Air Creations
, featuring kite makers and flyers from around the world, takes place in September at Ashton Court.
From 1974 until 2007, Ashton Court also played host to the Ashton Court festival
each summer, an outdoors music festival which used to be known as the Bristol Community Festival. Torrential rain during the 2007 festival and mounting costs incurred as a result of the Licensing Act 2003
led to the dissolution of the not-for-profit company which organized the event.
The annual Bristol Harbour Festival
features displays of tall ships and musical performances.
The St Pauls Carnival
also takes place in Bristol during the summer and features a procession and late night music.
The Bristol Slapstick Silent Comedy Festival
celebrates silent film comedy every spring and the organisation also promotes screenings throughout the year. In November the Encounters Short Film Festival offers a platform for new short films.
The biennial Wildscreen Festival showcases wildlife filmmaking in the city that is home to the BBC Natural History Unit
.
The Bristol Festival of Ideas
is an annual programme of debates and other events, which aims to "to stimulate people’s minds and passions with an inspiring programme of discussion and debate". It was first set up in 2005 as part of the city's ultimately unsuccessful bid to become the European Capital of Culture
for 2008, and awards an annual book prize, worth £10,000, to a book which "presents new, important and challenging ideas, which is rigorously argued, and which is engaging and accessible".
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The city's principal theatre company, the Bristol Old Vic
, was founded in 1946 as an offshoot of the Old Vic
company in London. Its premises on King Street
consist of the 1766 Theatre Royal (400 seats), a modern studio theatre (150 seats), and foyer and bar areas in the adjacent Coopers' Hall (built 1743). The Theatre Royal is a grade I listed building and was the oldest continuously operating theatre in England. The Bristol Hippodrome
is a larger theatre (1981 seats) which hosts national touring productions, whilst other theatres include the Tobacco Factory
(250 seats), The Brewery (90 seats), QEH
(220 seats), the Redgrave Theatre (at Clifton College
) (320 seats) and the Alma Tavern (50 seats). Arnolfini
stage a regular programme of experimental, physical and live art theatre and the University of Bristol
Drama Department has a regular programme of visiting companies and in-house work at the Wickham Theatre. Other venues which have hosted theatre productions include Hope Chapel (Hotwells
) (formerly the Hope Centre), the Hen and Chicken pub (Bedminster) and PACTS (Easton
).
Bristol's theatre scene includes a large variety of producing theatre companies, apart from the Bristol Old Vic, including Show of Strength Theatre Company
, Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory, Myrtle Theatre, Cirque Bijou, Desperate Men, Theatre West and Travelling Light Theatre Company. Theatre Bristol is a partnership between Bristol City Council, Arts Council England
and local theatre practitioners which aims to develop the theatre industry in Bristol.
There are also a number of organisations within the city which act to support theatre makers, for example Equity, the actors union, has a General Branch based in the city, and Residence which provides office, social and rehearsal space for several Bristol based theatre and performance companies.
The Bristol Old Vic Theatre School
, which originated in King Street as an offshoot of the Bristol Old Vic is now a separate company. Based in Clifton in a property bought with royalties from Julian Slade
's musical Salad Days, the school trains actors, stage managers, directors, lighting and sound technicians, designers and costumiers for work in stage, television, radio and film productions. BOVTS is an Associate School of the Faculty of Creative Arts of the University of the West of England
and an affiliate of the Conservatoire for Dance and Drama
. Alumni include Annette Crosbie
, Brian Blessed
, Daniel Day-Lewis
, Gene Wilder
, Jane Lapotaire
, Jeremy Irons
, Miranda Richardson
, Patrick Stewart
, Pete Postlethwaite
, Stephanie Cole
and Tim Pigott-Smith
.
The University of Bristol Drama Department offers undergraduate and post-graduate degrees in performance and screen studies. The University of the West of England offers undergraduate and post-graduate drama and film programmes. Circomedia
is a training school for circus and physical theatre skills offering foundation degrees and BTEC courses.
In addition there are around 25 active non-professional theatre companies in the Greater Bristol area listed in Bristol City Council's Leisure and Culture database.
, close friends of The Cortinas, who led the City's punk scene from 1976. Bristol's premier fanzine from this time through until early 1978 was Loaded. It featured all of the Bristol bands as well as those who visited the city, some of whom were promoted by the magazine.
Ten years later, Bristol was the birthplace of a type of English hip-hop
music called trip hop
or the Bristol Sound, epitomised in the work of artists such as Tricky
, Portishead, Smith & Mighty
and Massive Attack
. It is also a stronghold of drum n bass with notable bands like the Mercury Prize winning Roni Size
/Reprazent
and Kosheen
as well as the pioneering DJ Krust and More Rockers. The progressive house duo Way Out West
also hails from Bristol. This music is part of the wider Bristol Urban Culture scene which received international media attention in the 1990s and still thrives today.
Other forms of popular music also thrive on the city's scene. In the 1980s the city gave birth to thrash metal band Onslaught
who became the first non-American thrash band to sign to a major label. Other notable rockers from Bristol include folk rock outfit K-Passa, Stackridge, Act of Contrition, Chaos UK, Vice Squad, Wushcatte, The Claytown Troupe, Rita Lynch
, Herb Garden, Doreen Doreen, The Seers, Pigbag
, and The Blue Aeroplanes
. More recently a new wave of Bristol-based bands have been promoting themselves across the UK underground, including New Rhodes
,Santa Dog, Tin Pan Gang, The Private Side, Big Joan, You and the Atom Bomb, Riot:Noise, Two Day Rule, Alien Stash Tin, Osmium, Hacksaw, Allflaws
, Bronze Age Fox and Legends De Early.
There is also a left field / experimental music scene in Bristol, which has built on the tradition of Bristol bands like The Pop Group
, Third Eye Foundation and Crescent
. These musicians are supported by record labels such as Invada, Farm Girl, Blood Red Sound and Super Fi, and promoters such as Qu Junktions, Illegal Seagull, Let the Bastards Grind, Noise Annoys and the, now defunct, Choke (music collective)
. Despite regular performances and the success of many of its members , this scene tends to be passed over in the national press' view of Bristol music which focuses on Trip Hop, which represents only one aspect of the city's musical culture. Active bands include Gravenhurst
(Warp), Team Brick (Invada), The Heads (Invada), Gonga
(Invada), Joe Volk
(Invada), Fuck Buttons
(ATP - now moved to London), Hunting Lodge (Yosada), SJ Esau (Anticon
, Twisted Nerve), Bronnt Industries Kapital
(Static Caravan), Aut (Fällt), Geisha (Crucial Blast) and Defibrillators (Gravid Hands).
Bristol is home to many live music venues including the 2000-seat Colston Hall
, named after Edward Colston
, which can attract big names, the Trinity Centre (a community-run converted Church in the Old Market area of Bristol), the O2 Academy which is part of the national touring circuit for rock bands
, the Anson Rooms (part of the University of Bristol Union
), the Mothers Ruin, The Thekla, Fiddler's, Metropolis, the Bristol Folk House, Start the Bus, the Hatchet, the Fleece, the Croft, the Cooler and the Louisiana.
The city also has a popular jazz and blues scene with The Old Duke
pub being a popular venue for bands such as Fortune Drive. Internationally recognised jazz and blues musicians active in Bristol include Eddie Martin, Jim Blomfield and Andy Sheppard
. Other notable supporters of jazz include the Bristol Jazz Society, the Be-Bop Club and the East Bristol Jazz Club
. St George's Hall, on Brandon Hill
, is notable for its jazz
along with classical and world music
performances.
The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
no longer perform regularly at the Colston Hall, but there are regular performances by Bristol Bach Choir and Bristol Choral Society. The Brodsky Quartet
and the Bristol Ensemble regularly visit St Georges, Brandon Hill, which also hosts BBC Radio Three lunchtime concert series. Bristol University's Victoria Rooms
also have a seasonal programme of classical concerts.
houses collections of natural history, local archaeology, local glassware, Egyptology, Chinese ceramics and art, including the Bristol School
. Touring exhibitions from other galleries are regularly hosted.
The City Museum is also responsible for
The City Records Office in Hotwells
houses the extensive city archives.
The former Industrial Museum, housed in former warehouses at Prince's Wharf has been extensively re-built and, now called M Shed
opened as a museum of Bristol life in 2011.
The Watershed Media Centre
exhibits photography, digital arts and cinema. Arnolfini
specialises in contemporary art, live performance and dance and cinema. The Royal West of England Academy
in Clifton was founded in 1849 and exhibits works by William James Müller
and Francis Danby
amongst others.
Smaller collections include those of Spike Island
, the Alexander Gallery, F-block at the School of Creative Arts, Bower Ashton, Bristol Architecture Centre and Glenside Museum
. The Bristol Guild of Applied Art
also has a small gallery. Science interests are catered for by the At-Bristol
complex at Canon's Marsh, which includes 'hands-on' exhibits and a planetarium.
, and the tallest building in the city, St Mary Redcliffe
. The city is noted for its Victorian industrial architecture of the Bristol Byzantine
style, characterised by deep red and polychrome brickwork and Byzantine style arches.
Examples of most of the stages of the Architecture of the United Kingdom
from the mediaeval era
onwards are present in the city. Little remains of the fortifications of the walled city and castle, although several churches from the 12th century have survived. The Tudor period
saw several large mansions and estates being built for wealthy merchants outside the traditional city centre. Almshouses and public houses for the rest of the population remain mixed in amongst areas of more recent development. In the eighteenth century, several squares were laid out for the prosperous middle classes in the expanding suburbs which grew to take in many of the surrounding villages. The development of the floating harbour
provided a focus for industrial development and the local transport infrastructure including the Clifton Suspension Bridge
and Temple Meads railway station
, the original part of which was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel
. The twentieth century saw further expansion of the city, with the growth of the University of Bristol
buildings and the aircraft industry. During World War II
the city centre
suffered from extensive bombing during the Bristol Blitz
and redevelopment of shopping centres and office buildings continues into the twenty-first century.
, and Bristol Rugby Football Club. It also hosts an annual half marathon
. The city has a large number of amateur football, cricket and rugby clubs and many active participants in a range of sports from tennis to athletics, and rowing to golf.
, the Western Daily Press
, local evening paper the Evening Post
and a weekly free newspaper, the Bristol Observer
. A Bristol edition of Metro
is distributed for free on buses and on the streets. The local listings magazine, Venue
, is now published weekly after many years as a fortnightly publication and comprehensively covers the city's live music
, theatre
and arts
scenes. All of these papers are owned by the Northcliffe Group
.
In 2003 several local publications reported Bristol the "smiling capital of Britain" due to a study being conducted by the BBC
before Red Nose Day on 14 March. Psychology students from universities in the cities surveyed, found that 70 out of every 100 Bristolians returned a smile from Comic Relief
researchers. This put Bristol first in their "smiles per hour" census, the table makes interesting reading with Londoners only returning a smile 18% of the time. Bristol comedian Tony Robinson
said: "We do smile a lot in the city, but sometimes it is not really a smile - we are just a little bit constipated."
Bristol has a flourishing independent media scene, including The Bristolian, Bristle magazine and a local Indymedia website. The Spark is a magazine that was established in 1993 and is published quarterly. It covers the surging interest in all things green, ethical and complementary.
The Bristolian news sheet achieved a regular distribution of several thousand, pulling no punches with its satirical exposés of council and corporate corruption. The Bristolian, 'Smiter of the High and Mighty', even spawned a radical independent political party that polled an impressive 15% in Easton ward in 2003. In October 2005 it came runner up for the national Paul Foot
Award for investigative journalism
The anarchist-oriented Bristle, ‘fighting talk for Bristol and the South-West’, was started in 1997 and celebrated its twentieth issue in 2005. Its pages especially feature subvertising and other urban
street art to complement news, views and comments on the local activist scene as well as tackling issues such as drugs, mental health and housing.
1970s women’s liberation Feminist movement
paper Enough, was succeeded in the 1990s by the environmental and pagan Greenleaf (edited by George Firsoff), West Country Activist, Kebelian Voice, Planet Easton, the anarcho-feminist Bellow and present-day punk fanzine Everlong, all of which have been published in Bristol.
The Bristol Indymedia website, like the wider Indymedia network, provides a mix of news and articles that often tend towards a left-wing, progressive or anarchistic perspective. Bristol Indymedia volunteers have also produced films and run community media days (often at the Cube Microplex
).
and BBC West
television regions.
BBC Radio Bristol
is part of the BBC Local Radio
network broadcasting on AM and FM. Commercial stations include Heart (previously known as GWR and Radio West), Classic Gold 1260
(AM), Kiss 101
(FM), Star 107.2 (FM) and 106 Jack FM
, which replaced Original 106.5 (Bristol) in December 2009. Two community stations have been launched in the 21st century:BCFM
and Ujima 98 FM,
as well as two student radio stations, The Hub (University of the West of England
) and BURST
(University of Bristol
).
Urban radio projects such as the 1980s pirate, Savage Yet Tender and Dialect Radio (ceased October 2004) have proved to be more short-lived.
However, in February 2007, a unique online station, Radio Salaam Shalom was launched by a combined team of Muslim and Jewish volunteers allowing the two cultures to talk together and share their experiences.
Stop frame animation films and commercials painstakingly produced by Aardman Animations
and high quality television series focusing on the natural world have also brought fame and artistic credit to the city. Aardman films Wallace and Gromit
, Chicken Run
, Creature Comforts
and Robbie the Reindeer
were all produced in the city, and their premises in St Phillips Marsh hit the news in 2006, when a fire destroyed many of the sets from past productions.
Broadcasting House in Clifton is the headquarters of BBC West
and the BBC Natural History Unit
(NHU). Natural history
TV programmes produced a in Bristol include Life on Earth, The Living Planet
, The Trials of Life
, Life in the Freezer
, The Private Life of Plants
, The Life of Birds
and The Life of Mammals
. The NHU also produced Animal Magic, many episodes of which were filmed at Bristol Zoo
.
Popular television programmes filmed in Bristol include BBC dramas Casualty
and Being Human
, Channel 4 comedy-dramas Teachers
and Skins
and the ITV series Afterlife
, a number of which used local actors and residents as extras. Several games shows also film in the city, including BrainTeaser
and Deal or No Deal
. Other prolific series to be filmed here include Shoestring (1970s), Robin of Sherwood
(1980s) and The House of Eliott
(1990s). The sitcom Only Fools and Horses
was filmed in Bristol, despite being set in London as was The Young Ones
.
In film, Bristol has been the location for:
Bristol is also the birthplace of the actor Cary Grant
. In 2001 a statue was erected in his honour in Millennium Square (Bristol)
next to At-Bristol
in Canons Marsh.
and Hartcliffe
, speak a distinctive dialect of English
(known colloquially as Brizzle or Bristle). Uniquely for a large city in England, this is a rhotic dialect, in which the r in words like car is pronounced. It is perhaps this element of the dialect which has led outsiders to dub it "farmer speech".
The most unusual feature of this dialect, unique to Bristol, is the Bristol L (or Terminal L), in which an L sound is appended to words that end in a letter a. Additionally, -al is drawn out as -awl, and an l may be added within a word with an aw. Thus "area" becomes "areawl", "cereal" becomes "cereawl", "drawing" becomes "drawling" etc. This may lead to confusions between expressions like area engineer and aerial engineer which in "Bristle" sound identical. Other examples include 'Americawl' and 'Canadawl', and, when unsure, the answer 'I have no ideal'. In the same way, the Swedish Ikea
is known by some as "Ikeawl", and Asda
supermarket as "Asdawl". This is how the city's name evolved from Brycgstow to have a final 'L' sound: Bristol.
Another feature is the addition of S to verbs in the first and third person. Just as he goes, in Bristle I goes and they goes. As with other west country accents, H is often dropped from the start of words, th may become f, and -ing become -en.
Bristolians often add a redundant "mind", "look" or "see" to the end of sentences: "I'm not doing that, mind." A redundant "like" may be placed in the middle of a sentence, a feature that has become more common throughout the country.
Another Bristolian linguistic feature is the addition of a superfluous "to" in questions relating to direction or orientation. For example, "Where’s that?" would be phrased as "Where’s that to?" and "Where’s the park?" would become "Where’s the park to?". Interestingly, this speech feature is very predominant in Newfoundland English
, where many of that island's early European inhabitants originated from Bristol and other West Country ports. They lived on the island in relative isolation in the centuries to follow, maintaining this feature. These linguistic features can also be heard in Cardiff
.
A (slightly tongue in cheek) guide to Bristol's dialect is at http://www.thatbebristle.co.uk/ The linguist John C Wells codified the differences between a Bristol accent and Received Pronunciation
in his Accents of English series in the following way. It is much more similar to General American
than most other accents in Britain.
artists active in Bristol, probably the most known is Banksy
, who produced the album cover for Think Tank by britpop
band Blur
. Other Bristol graffiti artists include Nick Walker, Sickboy
, Inkie
, Stars, Lokey, cheo
.
Massive Attack
's Robert Del Naja
was also active as a graffiti artist with the nicknames of "3D" and "Delge" in the early 1980s. He appeared in the UK documentary called "Bombin’" alongside Wolverhampton
artist and later DJ and producer Goldie
.
Children of the Can: 25 Years of Bristol Graffiti by Felix Braun (FLX) and Steve Wright, is a book illustrating and documenting the street art scene in the city.
900,000 people visited an exhibition of Banksy's work at the Bristol Museum in 2009. In August 2011 Bristol City Council finally recognised the importance of graffiti to the city's culture by allowing an entire street to be painted by various international street artists. In August 2011 the See No Evil
public art event was installed in Nelson Street, transforming it into a walk-through graffiti gallery. Among other works, it includes a tall mural.
Bristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...
is a city
City
A city is a relatively large and permanent settlement. Although there is no agreement on how a city is distinguished from a town within general English language meanings, many cities have a particular administrative, legal, or historical status based on local law.For example, in the U.S...
in South West England
South West England
South West England is one of the regions of England defined by the Government of the United Kingdom for statistical and other purposes. It is the largest such region in area, covering and comprising Bristol, Gloucestershire, Somerset, Dorset, Wiltshire, Devon, Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly. ...
. As the largest city in the region it is a centre for the arts and sport. The region has a distinct West Country
West Country
The West Country is an informal term for the area of south western England roughly corresponding to the modern South West England government region. It is often defined to encompass the historic counties of Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Somerset and the City of Bristol, while the counties of...
dialect
Dialect
The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...
.
Events
Ashton Court
Ashton Court is a mansion house and estate to the west of Bristol in England. Although the estate lies mainly in North Somerset, it is owned by the City of Bristol. The estate has been a venue for a variety of leisure activities, including the now-defunct Ashton Court festival, Bristol...
to the west of the city play host to the Bristol International Balloon Fiesta
Bristol International Balloon Fiesta
The Bristol International Balloon Fiesta is held annually during August in Bristol, England. Teams from the UK and other parts of the world bring their hot air balloons to the site and participate in mass ascents where as many as 100 balloons may launch at a time.The event was first held in 1979...
, a major event for hot air ballooning
Hot air ballooning
Hot air ballooning is the activity of flying hot air balloons. Attractive aspects of ballooning include the exceptional quiet , the lack of a feeling of movement, and the bird's-eye view...
in Britain. The Fiesta draws a substantial crowd even for the early morning lift that typically begins at about 6.30 am. Events and a fairground entertain the crowds during the day. A second mass ascent is then made in the early evening, again taking advantage of lower wind speeds.
The annual Bristol International Festival of Kites and Air Creations
Bristol International Kite Festival
The Bristol International Kite Festival, full name Bristol International Festival of Kites & Air Creations, is held annually during September in Bristol, England. It takes place at the Ashton Court estate, which is owned by Bristol City Council, although it is actually in the district of North...
, featuring kite makers and flyers from around the world, takes place in September at Ashton Court.
From 1974 until 2007, Ashton Court also played host to the Ashton Court festival
Ashton Court Festival
The Ashton Court Festival was an outdoor music festival held annually in mid-July on the grounds of Ashton Court, just outside Bristol, England. The festival was a weekend event which featured a variety of local bands and national headliners...
each summer, an outdoors music festival which used to be known as the Bristol Community Festival. Torrential rain during the 2007 festival and mounting costs incurred as a result of the Licensing Act 2003
Licensing Act 2003
The Licensing Act of 2003 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom that applies only to England and Wales. The Act establishes a single integrated scheme for licensing premises which are used for the sale or supply of alcohol, to provide regulated entertainment, or to provide late night...
led to the dissolution of the not-for-profit company which organized the event.
The annual Bristol Harbour Festival
Bristol Harbour Festival
The Harbourside in Bristol, England, has hosted the Bristol Harbour Festival for 40 years, with over 250,000 visitors attending live music, street performances and a variety of live entertainment. The festival includes music stages, a dance stage, street theatre performances, and water displays...
features displays of tall ships and musical performances.
The St Pauls Carnival
St Pauls Carnival
St Pauls Carnival is an annual African Caribbean carnival held, usually on the first Saturday of July, in St Pauls, Bristol. The carnival started in 1967 and is run by a non-profit organisation, St Pauls Afrikan Caribbean Carnival Limited...
also takes place in Bristol during the summer and features a procession and late night music.
The Bristol Slapstick Silent Comedy Festival
Bristol Silents
Bristol Silents was established by Chris Daniels and Norman Taylor in 2000 to promote and celebrate silent cinema in the Bristol area and in the United Kingdom. The first ever event the organisation put on was a selection of Louise Brooks films in October 2000 at the Arnolfini, Bristol.The group...
celebrates silent film comedy every spring and the organisation also promotes screenings throughout the year. In November the Encounters Short Film Festival offers a platform for new short films.
The biennial Wildscreen Festival showcases wildlife filmmaking in the city that is home to the BBC Natural History Unit
BBC Natural History Unit
The BBC Natural History Unit is a department of the BBC dedicated to making television and radio programmes with a natural history or wildlife theme, especially nature documentaries...
.
The Bristol Festival of Ideas
Bristol Festival of Ideas
The Bristol Festival of Ideas is a project established in Bristol, England, which aims to "to stimulate people’s minds and passions with an inspiring programme of discussion and debate"...
is an annual programme of debates and other events, which aims to "to stimulate people’s minds and passions with an inspiring programme of discussion and debate". It was first set up in 2005 as part of the city's ultimately unsuccessful bid to become the European Capital of Culture
European Capital of Culture
The European Capital of Culture is a city designated by theEuropean Union for a period of one calendar year during which it organises a series of cultural events with a strong European dimension....
for 2008, and awards an annual book prize, worth £10,000, to a book which "presents new, important and challenging ideas, which is rigorously argued, and which is engaging and accessible".
Theatre
Bristol Old Vic
The Bristol Old Vic is a theatre company based at the Theatre Royal, King Street, in Bristol, England. The theatre complex includes the 1766 Theatre Royal, which claims to be the oldest continually-operating theatre in England, along with a 1970s studio theatre , offices and backstage facilities...
, was founded in 1946 as an offshoot of the Old Vic
Old Vic
The Old Vic is a theatre located just south-east of Waterloo Station in London on the corner of The Cut and Waterloo Road. Established in 1818 as the Royal Coburg Theatre, it was taken over by Emma Cons in 1880 when it was known formally as the Royal Victoria Hall. In 1898, a niece of Cons, Lilian...
company in London. Its premises on King Street
King Street, Bristol
King Street is a 17th century street in the historic city centre of Bristol, England.The street lies just south of the old town wall and was laid out in 1650 in order to develop the Town Marsh, the area then lying between the south or Marsh Wall and the Avon...
consist of the 1766 Theatre Royal (400 seats), a modern studio theatre (150 seats), and foyer and bar areas in the adjacent Coopers' Hall (built 1743). The Theatre Royal is a grade I listed building and was the oldest continuously operating theatre in England. The Bristol Hippodrome
Bristol Hippodrome
The Bristol Hippodrome is a theatre in the centre of Bristol, England with seating on three levels giving a capacity of 1,951. It frequently features West End theatre shows when they tour the UK as well regular visits by Welsh National Opera, and an annual pantomime.- History :The theatre was...
is a larger theatre (1981 seats) which hosts national touring productions, whilst other theatres include the Tobacco Factory
Tobacco Factory
The Tobacco Factory is the last remaining part of the old Wills Tobacco site on Raleigh Road, Southville, Bristol. It was saved from demolition by the architect George Ferguson and through his vision has become a model of urban regeneration...
(250 seats), The Brewery (90 seats), QEH
Queen Elizabeth's Hospital
Queen Elizabeth's Hospital is an independent school for boys in Clifton, Bristol, England founded in 1586. Stephen Holliday has served as Headmaster since 2000, having succeeded Dr Richard Gliddon...
(220 seats), the Redgrave Theatre (at Clifton College
Clifton College
Clifton College is a co-educational independent school in Clifton, Bristol, England, founded in 1862. In its early years it was notable for emphasising science in the curriculum, and for being less concerned with social elitism, e.g. by admitting day-boys on equal terms and providing a dedicated...
) (320 seats) and the Alma Tavern (50 seats). Arnolfini
Arnolfini
The Arnolfini is an arts centre and gallery in Bristol, England. It has a programme of contemporary art exhibitions, live art, music and dance events, poetry and book readings, talks, lectures and cinema. There is also a specialist art bookshop and a café bar. Educational activities are undertaken...
stage a regular programme of experimental, physical and live art theatre and the University of Bristol
University of Bristol
The University of Bristol is a public research university located in Bristol, United Kingdom. One of the so-called "red brick" universities, it received its Royal Charter in 1909, although its predecessor institution, University College, Bristol, had been in existence since 1876.The University is...
Drama Department has a regular programme of visiting companies and in-house work at the Wickham Theatre. Other venues which have hosted theatre productions include Hope Chapel (Hotwells
Hotwells
Hotwells is a district of the English port city of Bristol. It is located to the south of and below the high ground of Clifton, and directly to the north of the Floating Harbour. The southern entrance to the Avon Gorge, which connects those docks to the sea, lies at the western end of Hotwells. The...
) (formerly the Hope Centre), the Hen and Chicken pub (Bedminster) and PACTS (Easton
Easton, Bristol
Easton is both the name of a council ward in the city of Bristol in the United Kingdom, and an inner city area that lies partly within that ward. The Easton ward also contains the Whitehall and Netham areas of the city. Notable places within the ward include Lawrence Hill and Stapleton Road railway...
).
Bristol's theatre scene includes a large variety of producing theatre companies, apart from the Bristol Old Vic, including Show of Strength Theatre Company
Show of Strength Theatre Company
Sheila Hannon and Nick Thomas co-founded the company in Bristol in 1986, and it began as a two-handed company performing in small touring venues. In 1989 the company moved into an upstairs reception room above the Hen and Chicken pub in Bedminster. In the succeeding years they produced five...
, Shakespeare at the Tobacco Factory, Myrtle Theatre, Cirque Bijou, Desperate Men, Theatre West and Travelling Light Theatre Company. Theatre Bristol is a partnership between Bristol City Council, Arts Council England
Arts Council England
Arts Council England was formed in 1994 when the Arts Council of Great Britain was divided into three separate bodies for England, Scotland and Wales. It is a non-departmental public body of the Department of Culture, Media and Sport...
and local theatre practitioners which aims to develop the theatre industry in Bristol.
There are also a number of organisations within the city which act to support theatre makers, for example Equity, the actors union, has a General Branch based in the city, and Residence which provides office, social and rehearsal space for several Bristol based theatre and performance companies.
The Bristol Old Vic Theatre School
Bristol Old Vic Theatre School
The Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, opened by Laurence Olivier in 1946, is an affiliate of the Conservatoire for Dance and Drama, an organisation securing the highest standards of training in the performing arts, and is an associate school of the Faculty of Creative Arts of the University of the...
, which originated in King Street as an offshoot of the Bristol Old Vic is now a separate company. Based in Clifton in a property bought with royalties from Julian Slade
Julian Slade
Julian Penkivil Slade was an English writer of musical theatre best known for the show Salad Days, which he wrote in six weeks in 1954 and became the UK's longest-running show of the 1950s with over 2,288 performances....
's musical Salad Days, the school trains actors, stage managers, directors, lighting and sound technicians, designers and costumiers for work in stage, television, radio and film productions. BOVTS is an Associate School of the Faculty of Creative Arts of the University of the West of England
University of the West of England
The University of the West of England is a university based in the English city of Bristol. Its main campus is at Frenchay, about five miles north of the city centre...
and an affiliate of the Conservatoire for Dance and Drama
Conservatoire for Dance and Drama
The Conservatoire for Dance and Drama is a higher education institution in the United Kingdom. It was founded in 2001 to co-ordinate the activities of a number of affiliated schools providing higher-level vocational training in the performing arts...
. Alumni include Annette Crosbie
Annette Crosbie
Annette Crosbie, OBE is a Scottish character actor.-Life and career:Crosbie was born in Gorebridge, Midlothian, Scotland, to Presbyterian parents who disapproved of her becoming an actor. Nevertheless, she joined the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School while still in her teens...
, Brian Blessed
Brian Blessed
Brian Blessed is an English actor, known for his sonorous voice and "hearty, king-sized portrayals".-Early life:The son of William Blessed, a socialist miner, and Hilda Wall, Blessed was born in the town of Goldthorpe, West Riding of Yorkshire, England...
, Daniel Day-Lewis
Daniel Day-Lewis
Daniel Michael Blake Day-Lewis is an English actor with both British and Irish citizenship. His portrayals of Christy Brown in My Left Foot and Daniel Plainview in There Will Be Blood won Academy and BAFTA Awards for Best Actor, and Screen Actors Guild as well as Golden Globe Awards for the latter...
, Gene Wilder
Gene Wilder
Gene Wilder is an American stage and screen actor, director, screenwriter, and author.Wilder began his career on stage, making his screen debut in the film Bonnie and Clyde in 1967. His first major role was as Leopold Bloom in the 1968 film The Producers...
, Jane Lapotaire
Jane Lapotaire
Jane Lapotaire is a British actress.She studied at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School in the 1960s. Her role in the title role of Marie Curie first brought her to wide attention...
, Jeremy Irons
Jeremy Irons
Jeremy John Irons is an English actor. After receiving classical training at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, Irons began his acting career on stage in 1969, and has since appeared in many London theatre productions including The Winter's Tale, Macbeth, Much Ado About Nothing, The Taming of the...
, Miranda Richardson
Miranda Richardson
Miranda Jane Richardson is an English stage, film and television actor. She has been nominated for two Academy Awards, and has won two Golden Globes and a BAFTA during her career....
, Patrick Stewart
Patrick Stewart
Sir Patrick Hewes Stewart, OBE is an English film, television and stage actor, who has had a distinguished career in theatre and television for around half a century...
, Pete Postlethwaite
Pete Postlethwaite
Peter William "Pete" Postlethwaite, OBE, was an English stage, film and television actor.After minor television appearances including in The Professionals, Postlethwaite's first success came with the film Distant Voices, Still Lives in 1988. He played a mysterious lawyer, Mr...
, Stephanie Cole
Stephanie Cole
Stephanie Cole, OBE is an English stage, television, and film actress, best known for playing characters a great deal older than her actual age.-Early life:...
and Tim Pigott-Smith
Tim Pigott-Smith
Tim Pigott-Smith is an English film and television actor.-Early life:Pigott-Smith was born in Rugby, Warwickshire, the son of Margaret Muriel and Harry Thomas Pigott-Smith, who was a journalist. He was educated at Wyggeston Boys' School, Leicester, King Edward VI School Stratford-upon-Avon, and...
.
The University of Bristol Drama Department offers undergraduate and post-graduate degrees in performance and screen studies. The University of the West of England offers undergraduate and post-graduate drama and film programmes. Circomedia
Circomedia
Circomedia is a school for contemporary circus and physical theatre based in Bristol, England. The school offers a variety of training courses and workshops that teach circus skills in the context of physical theatre, performance and creativity....
is a training school for circus and physical theatre skills offering foundation degrees and BTEC courses.
In addition there are around 25 active non-professional theatre companies in the Greater Bristol area listed in Bristol City Council's Leisure and Culture database.
Music
The music scene is thriving and significant. In 2010, PRS for Music announced that Bristol is the 'most musical' city in the UK, based on the number of PRS members born in Bristol relative to its population. From the late 1970s onwards it was home to a crop of cultish bands combining punk, funk, dub and political consciousness, including The Pop GroupThe Pop Group
The Pop Group are a British post-punk band from Bristol, England, formed in 1978, whose dissonant sound spanned punk, free jazz, funk and dub reggae. Their lyrics were often political in nature...
, close friends of The Cortinas, who led the City's punk scene from 1976. Bristol's premier fanzine from this time through until early 1978 was Loaded. It featured all of the Bristol bands as well as those who visited the city, some of whom were promoted by the magazine.
Ten years later, Bristol was the birthplace of a type of English hip-hop
Hip hop music
Hip hop music, also called hip-hop, rap music or hip-hop music, is a musical genre consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted...
music called trip hop
Trip hop
Trip hop is a music genre consisting of downtempo electronic music which originated in the early 1990s in England, especially Bristol. Deriving from "post"-acid house, the term was first used by the British music media and press as a way to describe the more experimental variant of breakbeat which...
or the Bristol Sound, epitomised in the work of artists such as Tricky
Tricky
Tricky is an English musician and actor. As a producer and a musician, he is noted for a dark, rich and layered sound and a whispering sprechgesang lyrical style. Culturally, Tricky encourages an intertwining of societies, particularly in his musical fusion of rock and hip hop, high art and pop...
, Portishead, Smith & Mighty
Smith & Mighty
Smith & Mighty are a Drum and bass/Trip hop group from Bristol, consisting of Rob Smith and Ray Mighty. Their first releases, in the late 1980s, were breakbeat covers of "Anyone Who Had a Heart" and "Walk on By"...
and Massive Attack
Massive Attack
Massive Attack are an English DJ and trip hop duo from Bristol, England consisting of Robert "3D" Del Naja and Grant "Daddy G" Marshall. Working with co-producers, as well as various session musicians and guest vocalists, they make records and tour live. The duo are considered to be of the trip...
. It is also a stronghold of drum n bass with notable bands like the Mercury Prize winning Roni Size
Roni Size
Roni Size is a British record producer and DJ, who came to prominence in 1997 as the founder and leader of Reprazent, a drum and bass collective...
/Reprazent
Reprazent
Reprazent is a British drum and bass act formed by Roni Size. Their debut album New Forms won the Mercury Music Prize in 1997. Their follow-up album In The Mode featured artists including Rahzel, Zack de la Rocha of Rage Against the Machine and Method Man.Roni Size resurrected Reprazent in 2008...
and Kosheen
Kosheen
Kosheen are a British trip hop, breakbeat and rock group based in Bristol, England. The trio consists of producers Markee Substance and Darren Decoder , with singer and song writer Sian Evans...
as well as the pioneering DJ Krust and More Rockers. The progressive house duo Way Out West
Way Out West (producers)
Way Out West are a UK progressive house, trance and progressive breaks group from Bristol, England consisting of producers and DJs Jody Wisternoff and Nick Warren. They came to fame in the 1990s with chart hit "The Gift", and have since released four albums....
also hails from Bristol. This music is part of the wider Bristol Urban Culture scene which received international media attention in the 1990s and still thrives today.
Other forms of popular music also thrive on the city's scene. In the 1980s the city gave birth to thrash metal band Onslaught
Onslaught (band)
Onslaught are an English thrash metal band from Bristol, England. Initially active from 1983 to 1991, they reformed in 2004. The band initially drew influence from the second wave punk rock bands such as Discharge and The Exploited, and then adopted a straight forward thrash metal...
who became the first non-American thrash band to sign to a major label. Other notable rockers from Bristol include folk rock outfit K-Passa, Stackridge, Act of Contrition, Chaos UK, Vice Squad, Wushcatte, The Claytown Troupe, Rita Lynch
Rita Lynch
Rita Lynch is a singer songwriter who achieved a major profile in the UK the early 1990s and was the subject of a Channel 4 documentary, filmed as part of the Out series...
, Herb Garden, Doreen Doreen, The Seers, Pigbag
Pigbag
-Origin and formation:Pigbag were formed in Cheltenham in late 1980 by Chris Hamlin, a fashion student at Cheltenham Art College. Hamlin recruited multi-instrumentalist Roger Freeman, an old friend from his hometown of Birmingham, along with Chris Lee on trumpet and James Johnstone, a guitarist,...
, and The Blue Aeroplanes
The Blue Aeroplanes
The Blue Aeroplanes are an English rock band from Bristol, the mainstays of which: Gerard Langley, brother John Langley and dancer Wojtek Dmochowski originate from the earlier New Wave “Art band” Art Objects .-History:...
. More recently a new wave of Bristol-based bands have been promoting themselves across the UK underground, including New Rhodes
New Rhodes
New Rhodes were a British indie-pop four-piece. The band was formed in 2001 when James, Joe and Jack were students together at John Cabot CTC. During their early years the band were based in their hometown Bristol but moved to Hackney, London in 2004.-Career:...
,Santa Dog, Tin Pan Gang, The Private Side, Big Joan, You and the Atom Bomb, Riot:Noise, Two Day Rule, Alien Stash Tin, Osmium, Hacksaw, Allflaws
Allflaws
Allflaws is an English electronic, industrial and trip hop project, created in 2004 by Gabriel Curran in Bristol, United Kingdom. As its main producer, vocalist and songwriter, Curran is the only official member of Allflaws and is completely responsible for its direction...
, Bronze Age Fox and Legends De Early.
There is also a left field / experimental music scene in Bristol, which has built on the tradition of Bristol bands like The Pop Group
The Pop Group
The Pop Group are a British post-punk band from Bristol, England, formed in 1978, whose dissonant sound spanned punk, free jazz, funk and dub reggae. Their lyrics were often political in nature...
, Third Eye Foundation and Crescent
Crescent
In art and symbolism, a crescent is generally the shape produced when a circular disk has a segment of another circle removed from its edge, so that what remains is a shape enclosed by two circular arcs of different diameters which intersect at two points .In astronomy, a crescent...
. These musicians are supported by record labels such as Invada, Farm Girl, Blood Red Sound and Super Fi, and promoters such as Qu Junktions, Illegal Seagull, Let the Bastards Grind, Noise Annoys and the, now defunct, Choke (music collective)
Choke (music collective)
Choke was the name of a Bristol music collective formed in 2001. It supported D.I.Y music in the city through non-profit events and publications...
. Despite regular performances and the success of many of its members , this scene tends to be passed over in the national press' view of Bristol music which focuses on Trip Hop, which represents only one aspect of the city's musical culture. Active bands include Gravenhurst
Gravenhurst (band)
Gravenhurst is a vehicle for the music of the singer-songwriter, record producer and multi-instrumentalist, Nick Talbot, who lives in Bristol, England and is signed to Warp Records.-History:...
(Warp), Team Brick (Invada), The Heads (Invada), Gonga
Gonga (band)
Gonga is a heavy "stoner rock" band based in Bristol, UK. Formed in early 1998 by brothers George Elgie , Thomas Elgie and William Smalley as Octane Bud, they were later joined by Joe Volk in 2001 when the trio were offered their first gig at Shambala Festival. They signed to Invada Records in...
(Invada), Joe Volk
Joe Volk
-Solo:Volk is signed to Invada Records as a solo artist and released his debut album 'Derwent Waters Saint' in 2006. The album was recorded, engineered and produced by Adrian Utley, guitarist with the band Portishead...
(Invada), Fuck Buttons
Fuck Buttons
Fuck Buttons are a two-piece electronic group formed in Bristol in 2004 by Andrew Hung and Benjamin John Power.-Biography:Hung and Power grew up in Worcester. Hung was influenced by Aphex Twin, while Power was a fan of Mogwai. They developed a friendship in 2004 while attending art school in...
(ATP - now moved to London), Hunting Lodge (Yosada), SJ Esau (Anticon
Anticon
Anticon is an Oakland based independent record label founded in 1997. It is collectively owned among six founding artists and one manager...
, Twisted Nerve), Bronnt Industries Kapital
Bronnt Industries Kapital
Bronnt Industries Kapital is a musical project from Bristol, England based around producer and multi-instrumentalist Guy Bartell. It has released three studio albums, Virtute et Industria, Häxan and Hard for Justice....
(Static Caravan), Aut (Fällt), Geisha (Crucial Blast) and Defibrillators (Gravid Hands).
Bristol is home to many live music venues including the 2000-seat Colston Hall
Colston Hall
The Colston Hall is a concert hall and grade II listed building situated on Colston Street, Bristol, England. A popular venue catering for a variety of different entertainers, it seats approximately 2,075 and provides licensed bars, a café and restaurant....
, named after Edward Colston
Edward Colston
Edward Colston was a Bristol-born English merchant and Member of Parliament. Much of his wealth, although used often for philanthropic purposes, was acquired through the trade and exploitation of slaves...
, which can attract big names, the Trinity Centre (a community-run converted Church in the Old Market area of Bristol), the O2 Academy which is part of the national touring circuit for rock bands
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...
, the Anson Rooms (part of the University of Bristol Union
University of Bristol Union
BURST or Bristol University Radio Station is a student-run radio station, based in the University of Bristol broadcast online from the university's student union building, and occasionally via FM with a Restricted Service Licence. The station also holds an AM licence, and plans to begin...
), the Mothers Ruin, The Thekla, Fiddler's, Metropolis, the Bristol Folk House, Start the Bus, the Hatchet, the Fleece, the Croft, the Cooler and the Louisiana.
The city also has a popular jazz and blues scene with The Old Duke
The Old Duke
The Old Duke is a jazz and blues venue and pub situated on King Street, Bristol, England. Live music is played every night of the week, admission is free and it hosts an annual Jazz Festival...
pub being a popular venue for bands such as Fortune Drive. Internationally recognised jazz and blues musicians active in Bristol include Eddie Martin, Jim Blomfield and Andy Sheppard
Andy Sheppard
Andy Sheppard is a British jazz saxophonist and composer. He has been awarded several prizes at the British Jazz Awards, and has worked with some notable figures in contemporary jazz, including Gil Evans, Carla Bley, George Russell and Steve Swallow.-Biography:Sheppard was born in Warminster,...
. Other notable supporters of jazz include the Bristol Jazz Society, the Be-Bop Club and the East Bristol Jazz Club
East Bristol Jazz Club
East Bristol Jazz Club is based in Bristol, UK and was formed in 2001 with the aim of supporting and bringing new jazz and new musicians to the Bristol community....
. St George's Hall, on Brandon Hill
Brandon Hill
Brandon Hill is the highest mountain in County Kilkenny, Ireland. It has an elevation of . It is situated 7 miles east of Thomastown, in the south of County Kilkenny. Brandon Hill is in the barony of Gowran and in the province of Leinster...
, is notable for its jazz
Jazz
Jazz is a musical style that originated at the beginning of the 20th century in African American communities in the Southern United States. It was born out of a mix of African and European music traditions. From its early development until the present, jazz has incorporated music from 19th and 20th...
along with classical and world music
World music
World music is a term with widely varying definitions, often encompassing music which is primarily identified as another genre. This is evidenced by world music definitions such as "all of the music in the world" or "somebody else's local music"...
performances.
The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
The Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra is an English orchestra. Originally based in Bournemouth, the BSO moved its offices to the adjacent town of Poole in 1979....
no longer perform regularly at the Colston Hall, but there are regular performances by Bristol Bach Choir and Bristol Choral Society. The Brodsky Quartet
Brodsky Quartet
The Brodsky Quartet is a British string quartet, in existence since 1972, though only Ian Belton and Jacqueline Thomas are original members.In addition to performing classical music, and in particular the classic string quartet repertoire of Haydn, Beethoven, Schubert, Bartók and Shostakovich,...
and the Bristol Ensemble regularly visit St Georges, Brandon Hill, which also hosts BBC Radio Three lunchtime concert series. Bristol University's Victoria Rooms
Victoria Rooms (Bristol)
The Victoria Rooms, also known as the Vic Rooms, houses the University of Bristol's music department in Clifton, Bristol, England, on a prominent site at the junction of Queens Road and Whiteladies Road...
also have a seasonal programme of classical concerts.
Museums and galleries
The Bristol City Museum and Art GalleryBristol City Museum and Art Gallery
The Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery is a large museum and art gallery in Bristol, England. It is run by the city council with no entrance fee. It holds designated museum status, granted by the national government to protect outstanding museums...
houses collections of natural history, local archaeology, local glassware, Egyptology, Chinese ceramics and art, including the Bristol School
Bristol School
The Bristol School is a term applied retrospectively to describe the informal association and works of a group of artists working in Bristol, England, in the early 19th century. It was mainly active in the 1820s, although the origins and influences of the school have been traced over the...
. Touring exhibitions from other galleries are regularly hosted.
The City Museum is also responsible for
- The Tudor Red LodgeRed Lodge Museum, BristolThe Red Lodge Museum is an historic building in Bristol, England.It is open to the public is a branch of Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery.- History :...
, built in 1580 as a the lodge for a 'Great House' which once stood on the site now occpied by the Colston Hall. Displays include Tudor and Georgian rooms and a Tudor knot garden. - The Georgian HouseGeorgian House, BristolThe Georgian House is a historic building at 7 Great George Street, Bristol, England. It is open to the public and has been a branch of Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery since it was presented to the city as a museum in 1937.- History :...
was built by slave trader and plantation owner John Pinney in 1790 and is preserved in the style of a Georgian era town house. - The Blaise CastleBlaise CastleBlaise Castle is an 18th century mansion house and estate near Henbury in Bristol , England. Blaise Castle was immortalised by being described as "the finest place in England" in Jane Austen's novel Northanger Abbey....
House and estate on the northern outskirts of the city houses the social history collections. The grounds were designed by 18th century landscape gardener Humphry ReptonHumphry ReptonHumphry Repton was the last great English landscape designer of the eighteenth century, often regarded as the successor to Capability Brown; he also sowed the seeds of the more intricate and eclectic styles of the 19th century...
and John NashJohn Nash (architect)John Nash was a British architect responsible for much of the layout of Regency London.-Biography:Born in Lambeth, London, the son of a Welsh millwright, Nash trained with the architect Sir Robert Taylor. He established his own practice in 1777, but his career was initially unsuccessful and...
designed the dairy and conservatory. - The remains of Kings Weston Roman VillaKings Weston Roman VillaKings Weston Roman Villa is a Roman villa near Lawrence Weston in the north west of Bristol. The villa was discovered during the construction of the Lawrence Weston housing estate in 1947. Two distinct buildings were discovered, the Eastern building was fully excavated , the other lies mostly...
which is open on request.
The City Records Office in Hotwells
Hotwells
Hotwells is a district of the English port city of Bristol. It is located to the south of and below the high ground of Clifton, and directly to the north of the Floating Harbour. The southern entrance to the Avon Gorge, which connects those docks to the sea, lies at the western end of Hotwells. The...
houses the extensive city archives.
The former Industrial Museum, housed in former warehouses at Prince's Wharf has been extensively re-built and, now called M Shed
M Shed
The M Shed is a museum in Bristol, England, located on Prince's Wharf beside the Floating Harbour in a dockside transit shed that was previously occupied by the Bristol Industrial Museum...
opened as a museum of Bristol life in 2011.
The Watershed Media Centre
Watershed Media Centre
Watershed opened in June 1982 as the United Kingdom's first dedicated media centre. Based in former warehouses on the harbourside at Bristol, it hosts three cinemas, a café/bar, events/conferencing spaces, and office spaces for administrative and creative staff. It occupies the former V and W sheds...
exhibits photography, digital arts and cinema. Arnolfini
Arnolfini
The Arnolfini is an arts centre and gallery in Bristol, England. It has a programme of contemporary art exhibitions, live art, music and dance events, poetry and book readings, talks, lectures and cinema. There is also a specialist art bookshop and a café bar. Educational activities are undertaken...
specialises in contemporary art, live performance and dance and cinema. The Royal West of England Academy
Royal West of England Academy
The Royal West of England Academy is an art gallery where Queens Road meets Whiteladies Road, in Bristol, England.- History :The Academy was the first art gallery in Bristol. Its foundation was financed by a bequest of £2000 in the will of Ellen Sharples in 1849, and a group of artists in...
in Clifton was founded in 1849 and exhibits works by William James Müller
William James Müller
William James Müller , English landscape and figure painter, the best-known artist of the Bristol School.-Biography:...
and Francis Danby
Francis Danby
Francis Danby was an Irish painter of the Romantic era. His imaginative, dramatic landscapes were comparable to those of John Martin. Danby initially developed his imaginative style while he was the central figure in a group of artists who have come to be known as the Bristol School...
amongst others.
Smaller collections include those of Spike Island
Spike Island, Bristol
Spike Island is an area of the English port city of Bristol, adjoining the city centre. It comprises the strip of land between the Floating Harbour to the north and the tidal New Cut of the River Avon to the south, from the dock entrance to the west to Bathurst Basin in the east...
, the Alexander Gallery, F-block at the School of Creative Arts, Bower Ashton, Bristol Architecture Centre and Glenside Museum
Glenside Museum
Glenside Museum is situated within the Glenside Campus of the University of the West of England in Fishponds, Bristol, England.The museum was founded by Dr Donal F. Early; a consultant psychiatrist at Glenside from the 1950s. He collected items of memorabilia and started a collection on the balcony...
. The Bristol Guild of Applied Art
Bristol Guild of Applied Art
The Bristol Guild of Applied Art, more commonly referred to within Bristol as simply The Guild, is a privately held department store on Bristol's Park Street in the UK. Founded in 1908, the Guild was inspired by the philosophy of William Morris, and originally offered a place for artists and...
also has a small gallery. Science interests are catered for by the At-Bristol
At-Bristol
At-Bristol is a public science and technology "exploration" and education centre and charity in Bristol, England.As a visitor attraction, At-Bristol has hundreds of hands-on exhibits, and a Planetarium with seasonal shows for the over fives, and a 'Little Stars' show for children aged five and under...
complex at Canon's Marsh, which includes 'hands-on' exhibits and a planetarium.
Architecture
Bristol's architecture includes many examples of mediaeval, gothic, modern industrial and post-war architecture. Notable buildings include the gothic revival Wills Memorial BuildingWills Memorial Building
The Wills Memorial Building is a Neo Gothic building designed by Sir George Oatley and built as a memorial to Henry Overton Wills III...
, and the tallest building in the city, St Mary Redcliffe
St Mary Redcliffe
St. Mary Redcliffe is an Anglican parish church located in the Redcliffe district of the English port city of Bristol, close to the city centre. Constructed from the 12th to the 15th centuries, the church is a Grade 1 listed building, St...
. The city is noted for its Victorian industrial architecture of the Bristol Byzantine
Bristol Byzantine
Bristol Byzantine is a variety of Byzantine Revival architecture that was popular in the city of Bristol from about 1850 to 1880.Many buildings in the style have been destroyed or demolished, but notable surviving examples include the Colston Hall, the Granary on Welsh Back, the Carriage Works, in...
style, characterised by deep red and polychrome brickwork and Byzantine style arches.
Examples of most of the stages of the Architecture of the United Kingdom
Architecture of the United Kingdom
The Architecture of England refers to the architecture practised in the territory of the present-day country of England, and in the historic Kingdom of England...
from the mediaeval era
Middle Ages
The Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
onwards are present in the city. Little remains of the fortifications of the walled city and castle, although several churches from the 12th century have survived. The Tudor period
Tudor period
The Tudor period usually refers to the period between 1485 and 1603, specifically in relation to the history of England. This coincides with the rule of the Tudor dynasty in England whose first monarch was Henry VII...
saw several large mansions and estates being built for wealthy merchants outside the traditional city centre. Almshouses and public houses for the rest of the population remain mixed in amongst areas of more recent development. In the eighteenth century, several squares were laid out for the prosperous middle classes in the expanding suburbs which grew to take in many of the surrounding villages. The development of the floating harbour
Bristol Harbour
Bristol Harbour is the harbour in the city of Bristol, England. The harbour covers an area of . It has existed since the 13th century but was developed into its current form in the early 19th century by installing lock gates on a tidal stretch of the River Avon in the centre of the city and...
provided a focus for industrial development and the local transport infrastructure including the Clifton Suspension Bridge
Clifton Suspension Bridge
Brunel died in 1859, without seeing the completion of the bridge. Brunel's colleagues in the Institution of Civil Engineers felt that completion of the Bridge would be a fitting memorial, and started to raise new funds...
and Temple Meads railway station
Bristol Temple Meads railway station
Bristol Temple Meads railway station is the oldest and largest railway station in Bristol, England. It is an important transport hub for public transport in Bristol, with bus services to various parts of the city and surrounding districts, and a ferry service to the city centre in addition to the...
, the original part of which was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel
Isambard Kingdom Brunel
Isambard Kingdom Brunel, FRS , was a British civil engineer who built bridges and dockyards including the construction of the first major British railway, the Great Western Railway; a series of steamships, including the first propeller-driven transatlantic steamship; and numerous important bridges...
. The twentieth century saw further expansion of the city, with the growth of the University of Bristol
University of Bristol
The University of Bristol is a public research university located in Bristol, United Kingdom. One of the so-called "red brick" universities, it received its Royal Charter in 1909, although its predecessor institution, University College, Bristol, had been in existence since 1876.The University is...
buildings and the aircraft industry. During World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
the city centre
Bristol city centre
Bristol city centre is the commercial, cultural and business centre of Bristol, England. It is the area south of the central ring road and north of the Floating Harbour, bounded north by St Pauls and Easton, east by Temple Meads and Redcliffe, and west by Clifton and Canon's Marsh...
suffered from extensive bombing during the Bristol Blitz
Bristol Blitz
Bristol was the fifth most heavily bombed British city of World War II. The presence of Bristol Harbour and the Bristol Aeroplane Company made it a target for bombing by the Nazi German Luftwaffe who were able to trace a course up the River Avon from Avonmouth using reflected moonlight on the...
and redevelopment of shopping centres and office buildings continues into the twenty-first century.
Sport
Bristol is the home of two major football clubs - Bristol City FC and Bristol Rovers FC, the Gloucestershire County Cricket ClubGloucestershire County Cricket Club
Gloucestershire County Cricket Club is one of the 18 major county clubs which make up the English and Welsh national cricket structure, representing the historic county of Gloucestershire. Its limited overs team is called the Gloucestershire Gladiators....
, and Bristol Rugby Football Club. It also hosts an annual half marathon
Half marathon
A half marathon is a road running event of . It is half the distance of a marathon and usually run on roads. Participation in half marathons has grown steadily recently. One of the main reasons for this is that it is a challenging distance, but does not require the same level of training that a...
. The city has a large number of amateur football, cricket and rugby clubs and many active participants in a range of sports from tennis to athletics, and rowing to golf.
News and magazines
Bristol is the home of the regional morning newspaperNewspaper
A newspaper is a scheduled publication containing news of current events, informative articles, diverse features and advertising. It usually is printed on relatively inexpensive, low-grade paper such as newsprint. By 2007, there were 6580 daily newspapers in the world selling 395 million copies a...
, the Western Daily Press
Western Daily Press
The Western Daily Press is a regional newspaper covering parts of South West England , mainly Gloucestershire, Wiltshire and Somerset as well as the metropolitan areas of Bath and North East Somerset and the Bristol area. It is published Monday to Saturday in Bristol, UK...
, local evening paper the Evening Post
Bristol Evening Post
The Bristol Evening Post is a newspaper covering news in the city of Bristol, including stories from the whole of Greater Bristol, Northern Somerset and South Gloucestershire....
and a weekly free newspaper, the Bristol Observer
Bristol Observer
The Bristol Observer started out as a Kingswood and Keynsham Observer, a weekly paper, but at this time it was a paid for publication. In 1981 it became the Bristol Observer Series and was distributed free....
. A Bristol edition of Metro
Metro (Associated Metro Limited)
Metro is a free daily newspaper in the United Kingdom published by Associated Newspapers Ltd . It is available from Monday to Friday each week on many public transport services across the United Kingdom.-History:The paper was launched in London in 1999, and can now be found in 14 UK urban centres...
is distributed for free on buses and on the streets. The local listings magazine, Venue
Venue (magazine)
Venue is the what's on magazine for the Bristol and Bath areas of the UK.It was founded in 1982 by journalists who had been working for another Bristol magazine, Out West, which had been consciously modelled on London's Time Out magazine....
, is now published weekly after many years as a fortnightly publication and comprehensively covers the city's live music
Live Music
Live Music is a reggaeton company owned by DJ Giann.-Artists:* Jowell & Randy* Tony Lenta* Watussi* De La Ghetto* Guelo Star* Galante "El Emperador"-Producers:*DJ Blass*Dexter*Mr. Greenz*DJ Giann*Los Hitmen*Dirty Joe*ALX...
, theatre
Theatre
Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...
and arts
ARts
aRts, which stands for analog Real time synthesizer, is an audio framework that is no longer under development. It is best known for previously being used in KDE to simulate an analog synthesizer....
scenes. All of these papers are owned by the Northcliffe Group
Daily Mail and General Trust
Daily Mail and General Trust plc is a British media conglomerate, one of the largest in Europe. In the UK, it has interests in national and regional newspapers, television and radio. The company has extensive activities based outside the UK, through Northcliffe Media, DMG Radio Australia, DMG World...
.
| Bristol | 70 |
| Glasgow | 68 |
| Exeter | 54 |
| Manchester | 54 |
| Wrexham | 42 |
| Cardiff | 41 |
| Liverpool | 41 |
| Norwich | 35 |
| Newcastle | 32 |
| Birmingham | 31 |
| Southampton | 24 |
| London | 18 |
| Edinburgh | 4 |
| Nottingham | 0 |
In 2003 several local publications reported Bristol the "smiling capital of Britain" due to a study being conducted by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
before Red Nose Day on 14 March. Psychology students from universities in the cities surveyed, found that 70 out of every 100 Bristolians returned a smile from Comic Relief
Comic Relief
Comic Relief is an operating British charity, founded in 1985 by the comedy scriptwriter Richard Curtis and comedian Lenny Henry in response to famine in Ethiopia. The highlight of Comic Relief's appeal is Red Nose Day, a biennial telethon held in March, alternating with sister project Sport Relief...
researchers. This put Bristol first in their "smiles per hour" census, the table makes interesting reading with Londoners only returning a smile 18% of the time. Bristol comedian Tony Robinson
Tony Robinson
Tony Robinson is an English actor, comedian, author, broadcaster and political campaigner. He is best known for playing Baldrick in the BBC television series Blackadder, and for hosting Channel 4 programmes such as Time Team and The Worst Jobs in History. Robinson is a member of the Labour Party...
said: "We do smile a lot in the city, but sometimes it is not really a smile - we are just a little bit constipated."
Bristol has a flourishing independent media scene, including The Bristolian, Bristle magazine and a local Indymedia website. The Spark is a magazine that was established in 1993 and is published quarterly. It covers the surging interest in all things green, ethical and complementary.
The Bristolian news sheet achieved a regular distribution of several thousand, pulling no punches with its satirical exposés of council and corporate corruption. The Bristolian, 'Smiter of the High and Mighty', even spawned a radical independent political party that polled an impressive 15% in Easton ward in 2003. In October 2005 it came runner up for the national Paul Foot
Paul Foot
Paul Mackintosh Foot was a British investigative journalist, political campaigner, author, and long-time member of the Socialist Workers Party...
Award for investigative journalism
Investigative journalism
Investigative journalism is a form of journalism in which reporters deeply investigate a single topic of interest, often involving crime, political corruption, or corporate wrongdoing. An investigative journalist may spend months or years researching and preparing a report. Investigative journalism...
The anarchist-oriented Bristle, ‘fighting talk for Bristol and the South-West’, was started in 1997 and celebrated its twentieth issue in 2005. Its pages especially feature subvertising and other urban
Urban culture
Urban culture is the culture of towns and cities. In the United States, Urban culture may also sometimes be used as a euphemistic reference to contemporary African American culture.- African American culture :...
street art to complement news, views and comments on the local activist scene as well as tackling issues such as drugs, mental health and housing.
1970s women’s liberation Feminist movement
Feminist movement
The feminist movement refers to a series of campaigns for reforms on issues such as reproductive rights, domestic violence, maternity leave, equal pay, women's suffrage, sexual harassment and sexual violence...
paper Enough, was succeeded in the 1990s by the environmental and pagan Greenleaf (edited by George Firsoff), West Country Activist, Kebelian Voice, Planet Easton, the anarcho-feminist Bellow and present-day punk fanzine Everlong, all of which have been published in Bristol.
The Bristol Indymedia website, like the wider Indymedia network, provides a mix of news and articles that often tend towards a left-wing, progressive or anarchistic perspective. Bristol Indymedia volunteers have also produced films and run community media days (often at the Cube Microplex
Cube Microplex
The Cube Microplex is a cinema and event venue in central Bristol, which operates as a non-profit volunteer-run cooperative. Since opening in 1998 it has hosted artistic and cultural events including films and music performances as well as providing a focal point for the local artistic community...
).
Local broadcasters
Bristol is in the ITV WestHTV
HTV, now legally known as ITV Wales & West, is the ITV contractor for Wales and the West of England, which operated from studios in Cardiff and Bristol. The company provided commercial television for the dual-region 'Wales and West' franchise, which it won from TWW in 1968...
and BBC West
BBC West
BBC West is the BBC English Region serving Bristol, Bath and North East Somerset, North Somerset, South Gloucestershire, Somerset, Gloucestershire and Wiltshire.-Television:...
television regions.
BBC Radio Bristol
BBC Radio Bristol
BBC Radio Bristol is the BBC Local Radio service for the English city of Bristol and the surrounding former Avon area. Launched in September 1970, it broadcasts from Broadcasting House in Bristol on FM frequencies 94.9 MHz , 104.6 MHz , 103.6 MHz , on AM 1548 kHz and on DAB.The...
is part of the BBC Local Radio
BBC Local Radio
BBC Local Radio is the BBC's regional radio service for England and the Channel Islands, consisting of 40 stations. They cover a variety of areas with some serving a city and surrounding areas, for example BBC Radio Manchester; a county, for example BBC Radio Norfolk; an administrative region for...
network broadcasting on AM and FM. Commercial stations include Heart (previously known as GWR and Radio West), Classic Gold 1260
Brunel Classic Gold
Gold is a regional AM station in the west of England.The station carries the Gold programming, except for a local 4-hour afternoon programme from 12pm to 4pm, which is different in the stations two sub-regions.-Programmes:* Breakfast...
(AM), Kiss 101
Kiss 101
Kiss 101 was a radio station in Bristol broadcasting out to South Wales and South West England playing Hip Hop, dance music and R&B. It now forms part of a national Kiss station, which also includes Kiss 105-108 and Kiss 100 and is owned by Bauer Radio.-History:The station originally started...
(FM), Star 107.2 (FM) and 106 Jack FM
106 Jack FM (Bristol)
106 Jack FM is an English language adult hits format radio station that broadcasts on 106.5MHz FM in Bristol, United Kingdom and is owned by Celador Radio.-History:...
, which replaced Original 106.5 (Bristol) in December 2009. Two community stations have been launched in the 21st century:BCFM
BCFM
BCFM or Bristol Community FM is a community radio station broadcasting to the City of Bristol in the United Kingdom on 93.2 FM. BCfm started broadcasting on 26 March 2007...
and Ujima 98 FM,
as well as two student radio stations, The Hub (University of the West of England
University of the West of England
The University of the West of England is a university based in the English city of Bristol. Its main campus is at Frenchay, about five miles north of the city centre...
) and BURST
Burst
Burst may refer to:*Burst mode , a mode of operation where events occur in rapid succession**Burst transmission, a term in telecommunications**Burst switching, a feature of some packet-switched networks**Bursting, a signaling mode of neurons...
(University of Bristol
University of Bristol
The University of Bristol is a public research university located in Bristol, United Kingdom. One of the so-called "red brick" universities, it received its Royal Charter in 1909, although its predecessor institution, University College, Bristol, had been in existence since 1876.The University is...
).
Urban radio projects such as the 1980s pirate, Savage Yet Tender and Dialect Radio (ceased October 2004) have proved to be more short-lived.
However, in February 2007, a unique online station, Radio Salaam Shalom was launched by a combined team of Muslim and Jewish volunteers allowing the two cultures to talk together and share their experiences.
Film and television production
Aardman Animations
Aardman Animations, Ltd., also known as Aardman Studios, or simply as Aardman, is a British animation studio based in Bristol, United Kingdom. The studio is known for films made using stop-motion clay animation techniques, particularly those featuring Plasticine characters Wallace and Gromit...
and high quality television series focusing on the natural world have also brought fame and artistic credit to the city. Aardman films Wallace and Gromit
Wallace and Gromit
Wallace and Gromit are the main characters in a series consisting of four British animated short films and a feature-length film by Nick Park of Aardman Animations...
, Chicken Run
Chicken Run
Chicken Run is a 2000 British stop-motion animation film made by the Aardman Animations studios, the production studio of the Oscar-winning Wallace and Gromit films...
, Creature Comforts
Creature Comforts
Creature Comforts was originally a 1989 British humorous animated short film about how animals feel about living in a zoo, featuring the voices of the British public "spoken" by the animals. It was created by Nick Park and Aardman Animations...
and Robbie the Reindeer
Robbie the Reindeer
Robbie the Reindeer is a series of three animated comedy television specials shown on BBC One at Christmas, filmed in aid of Comic Relief. Written by Kevin Cecil and Andy Riley, the programmes are based on the story of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, with Robbie as Rudolph's son and the tenth of...
were all produced in the city, and their premises in St Phillips Marsh hit the news in 2006, when a fire destroyed many of the sets from past productions.
Broadcasting House in Clifton is the headquarters of BBC West
BBC West
BBC West is the BBC English Region serving Bristol, Bath and North East Somerset, North Somerset, South Gloucestershire, Somerset, Gloucestershire and Wiltshire.-Television:...
and the BBC Natural History Unit
BBC Natural History Unit
The BBC Natural History Unit is a department of the BBC dedicated to making television and radio programmes with a natural history or wildlife theme, especially nature documentaries...
(NHU). Natural history
Natural history
Natural history is the scientific research of plants or animals, leaning more towards observational rather than experimental methods of study, and encompasses more research published in magazines than in academic journals. Grouped among the natural sciences, natural history is the systematic study...
TV programmes produced a in Bristol include Life on Earth, The Living Planet
The Living Planet
The Living Planet: A Portrait of the Earth is a BBC nature documentary series written and presented by David Attenborough, first transmitted in the UK from 19 January 1984....
, The Trials of Life
The Trials of Life
The Trials of Life: A Natural History of Behaviour is a BBC nature documentary series written and presented by David Attenborough, first transmitted in the UK from 4 October 1990....
, Life in the Freezer
Life in the Freezer
Life in the Freezer is a BBC nature documentary series written and presented by David Attenborough, first transmitted in the UK from 18 November 1993....
, The Private Life of Plants
The Private Life of Plants
The Private Life of Plants is a BBC nature documentary series written and presented by David Attenborough, first shown in the UK from 11 January 1995....
, The Life of Birds
The Life of Birds
The Life of Birds is a BBC nature documentary series written and presented by David Attenborough, first transmitted in the UK from 21 October 1998....
and The Life of Mammals
The Life of Mammals
The Life of Mammals is a nature documentary series written and presented by David Attenborough, first transmitted in the UK from 20 November 2002....
. The NHU also produced Animal Magic, many episodes of which were filmed at Bristol Zoo
Bristol Zoo
Bristol Zoo is a zoo in the city of Bristol in South West England. The zoo's stated mission is "Bristol Zoo Gardens maintains and defends biodiversity through breeding endangered species, conserving threatened species and habitats and promoting a wider understanding of the natural...
.
Popular television programmes filmed in Bristol include BBC dramas Casualty
Casualty (TV series)
Casualty, stylised as Casual+y, is a British weekly television show broadcast on BBC One, and the longest-running emergency medical drama television series in the world. Created by Jeremy Brock and Paul Unwin, it was first broadcast on 6 September 1986, and transmitted in the UK on BBC One. The...
and Being Human
Being Human (TV series)
Being Human is a British supernatural drama television series. It was created and written by Toby Whithouse and is currently broadcast on BBC Three. The show blends elements of flatshare comedy and horror drama...
, Channel 4 comedy-dramas Teachers
Teachers (UK TV series)
Teachers is a British television sitcom, originally shown on Channel 4. The series follows a group of secondary school teachers in their daily lives....
and Skins
Skins (TV series)
Skins is a BAFTA award-winning British teen drama that follows a group of teenagers in Bristol, South West England, through the two years of college. The controversial plot line explores issues such as dysfunctional families, mental illness , adolescent sexuality, substance abuse and death...
and the ITV series Afterlife
Afterlife (TV series)
Afterlife is a British television drama series, produced by independent production company Clerkenwell Films for the ITV network...
, a number of which used local actors and residents as extras. Several games shows also film in the city, including BrainTeaser
BrainTeaser
BrainTeaser was a British game show, first broadcast in 2002, produced by Endemol UK subsidiary Cheetah Productions.BrainTeaser was live, with phone-in viewer puzzles being announced and played during the show in addition to the studio game...
and Deal or No Deal
Deal or No Deal (UK game show)
Deal or No Deal is the United Kingdom version of the Endemol game show format Deal or No Deal, hosted by Noel Edmonds. 1,758 shows have been aired...
. Other prolific series to be filmed here include Shoestring (1970s), Robin of Sherwood
Robin of Sherwood
Robin of Sherwood , was a British television series, based on the legend of Robin Hood. Created by Richard Carpenter, it was produced by HTV in association with Goldcrest, and ran from 1984 to 1986 on the ITV network. In America it was retitled Robin Hood and shown on the premium cable TV channel...
(1980s) and The House of Eliott
The House of Eliott
The House of Eliott is a British television series produced and broadcast by the BBC in three series between 1991 and 1994. The series starred Stella Gonet and Louise Lombard as two sisters in 1920s London who establish a dressmaking business and eventually their own haute couture fashion house...
(1990s). The sitcom Only Fools and Horses
Only Fools and Horses
Only Fools and Horses is a British sitcom, created and written by John Sullivan. Seven series were originally broadcast on BBC One in the United Kingdom between 1981 and 1991, with sporadic Christmas specials until 2003...
was filmed in Bristol, despite being set in London as was The Young Ones
The Young Ones (TV series)
The Young Ones is a British sitcom, first broadcast in 1982, which ran for two series on BBC2. Its anarchic, offbeat humour helped bring alternative comedy to television in the 1980s and made household names of its writers and performers...
.
In film, Bristol has been the location for:
- The Truth About LoveThe Truth About LoveThe Truth About Love is a 2004 film directed by John Hay.-Synopsis:In Bristol, as part of a drunken bet with her sister , a happily married Englishwoman sends an anonymous Valentine's Day card to her husband to see if he hides it...
2007 - Starter for 10 2006
- These Foolish ThingsThese Foolish Things (film)These Foolish Things is a 2005 film based on Noel Langley's novel There's a Porpoise Close Behind us and directed by Julia Taylor-Stanley. It stars Zoe Tapper, David Leon, Lauren Bacall, Anjelica Huston and Julia McKenzie. The drama was largerly filmed on location in Bristol, Cheltenham and...
2004 - Paper Mask 1990
- Truly, Madly, DeeplyTruly, Madly, DeeplyTruly, Madly, Deeply is a 1990 film made for the BBC's Screen Two series.-Overview:The film was written and directed by Anthony Minghella and stars Juliet Stevenson and Alan Rickman. Minghella said he wrote the script specifically as “a vehicle for [Stevenson] to express all her talents...
1990 - The Titfield ThunderboltThe Titfield ThunderboltThe Titfield Thunderbolt is a 1953 British comedy film about a group of villagers trying to prevent British Railways from closing the fictional Titfield branch line. The film was written by T.E.B...
1953
Bristol is also the birthplace of the actor Cary Grant
Cary Grant
Archibald Alexander Leach , better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was an English actor who later took U.S. citizenship...
. In 2001 a statue was erected in his honour in Millennium Square (Bristol)
Millennium Square (Bristol)
Millennium Square is a location in the centre of Bristol, England. It was built as part of the At Bristol development, and has become a popular public area.-Attractions:...
next to At-Bristol
At-Bristol
At-Bristol is a public science and technology "exploration" and education centre and charity in Bristol, England.As a visitor attraction, At-Bristol has hundreds of hands-on exhibits, and a Planetarium with seasonal shows for the over fives, and a 'Little Stars' show for children aged five and under...
in Canons Marsh.
Dialect
Older Bristolians and those that live in areas which have had less influence from students and immigration, such as SouthmeadSouthmead
Southmead is a northern suburb and council ward of Bristol, in the southwest of England. The town of Filton , and the Bristol suburbs of Monks Park, Horfield, Henleaze and Westbury on Trym lie on its boundaries....
and Hartcliffe
Hartcliffe
Hartcliffe is the name of both a council ward and a district of the city of Bristol in the United Kingdom which lies within that ward. The ward contains the areas of Hartcliffe and Headley Park, as well as small portions of Withywood and Bishopsworth....
, speak a distinctive dialect of English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
(known colloquially as Brizzle or Bristle). Uniquely for a large city in England, this is a rhotic dialect, in which the r in words like car is pronounced. It is perhaps this element of the dialect which has led outsiders to dub it "farmer speech".
The most unusual feature of this dialect, unique to Bristol, is the Bristol L (or Terminal L), in which an L sound is appended to words that end in a letter a. Additionally, -al is drawn out as -awl, and an l may be added within a word with an aw. Thus "area" becomes "areawl", "cereal" becomes "cereawl", "drawing" becomes "drawling" etc. This may lead to confusions between expressions like area engineer and aerial engineer which in "Bristle" sound identical. Other examples include 'Americawl' and 'Canadawl', and, when unsure, the answer 'I have no ideal'. In the same way, the Swedish Ikea
IKEA
IKEA is a privately held, international home products company that designs and sells ready-to-assemble furniture such as beds and desks, appliances and home accessories. The company is the world's largest furniture retailer...
is known by some as "Ikeawl", and Asda
Asda
Asda Stores Ltd is a British supermarket chain which retails food, clothing, general merchandise, toys and financial services. It also has a mobile telephone network, , Asda Mobile...
supermarket as "Asdawl". This is how the city's name evolved from Brycgstow to have a final 'L' sound: Bristol.
Another feature is the addition of S to verbs in the first and third person. Just as he goes, in Bristle I goes and they goes. As with other west country accents, H is often dropped from the start of words, th may become f, and -ing become -en.
Bristolians often add a redundant "mind", "look" or "see" to the end of sentences: "I'm not doing that, mind." A redundant "like" may be placed in the middle of a sentence, a feature that has become more common throughout the country.
Another Bristolian linguistic feature is the addition of a superfluous "to" in questions relating to direction or orientation. For example, "Where’s that?" would be phrased as "Where’s that to?" and "Where’s the park?" would become "Where’s the park to?". Interestingly, this speech feature is very predominant in Newfoundland English
Newfoundland English
Newfoundland English is a name for several accents and dialects thereof the English found in the province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Most of these differ substantially from the English commonly spoken elsewhere in Canada...
, where many of that island's early European inhabitants originated from Bristol and other West Country ports. They lived on the island in relative isolation in the centuries to follow, maintaining this feature. These linguistic features can also be heard in Cardiff
Cardiff
Cardiff is the capital, largest city and most populous county of Wales and the 10th largest city in the United Kingdom. The city is Wales' chief commercial centre, the base for most national cultural and sporting institutions, the Welsh national media, and the seat of the National Assembly for...
.
A (slightly tongue in cheek) guide to Bristol's dialect is at http://www.thatbebristle.co.uk/ The linguist John C Wells codified the differences between a Bristol accent and Received Pronunciation
Received Pronunciation
Received Pronunciation , also called the Queen's English, Oxford English or BBC English, is the accent of Standard English in England, with a relationship to regional accents similar to the relationship in other European languages between their standard varieties and their regional forms...
in his Accents of English series in the following way. It is much more similar to General American
General American
General American , also known as Standard American English , is a major accent of American English. The accent is not restricted to the United States...
than most other accents in Britain.
| RP English Received Pronunciation Received Pronunciation , also called the Queen's English, Oxford English or BBC English, is the accent of Standard English in England, with a relationship to regional accents similar to the relationship in other European languages between their standard varieties and their regional forms... |
Bristol |
|---|---|
| /ɑː/ as in 'bath' | [a] |
| /ɑː/ as in 'start' | [ar] |
| /e/ as in 'dress' | [ɛ] |
| /iː/ as in 'fleece' | [i] |
| /aɪ/ as in 'price' | [ɑɪ] |
| /əʊ/ as in 'goat' | [ɔʊ] |
| /eɪ/ as in 'face' | [ɛɪ] |
| /ɔː/ as in 'thought' | [ɔ] |
| /uː/ as in 'goose' | [u] |
| /ɪə/ as in 'near' | [ir] |
| /eə/ as in 'square' | [ɛɪr] |
| /ɔː/ as in 'force' | [ɔr] |
| /ɜː/ as in nurse | [ɛr] |
| /uə/ as in 'cure' | [ur] |
| /ə/ as in 'letter' | [ər] |
| /ə/ as in 'comma' | [ə] or [əl] |
Graffiti
There are several graffitiGraffiti
Graffiti is the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner on property....
artists active in Bristol, probably the most known is Banksy
Banksy
Banksy is a pseudonymous England-based graffiti artist, political activist, film director, and painter.His satirical street art and subversive epigrams combine irreverent dark humour with graffiti done in a distinctive stencilling technique...
, who produced the album cover for Think Tank by britpop
Britpop
Britpop is a subgenre of alternative rock that originated in the United Kingdom. Britpop emerged from the British independent music scene of the early 1990s and was characterised by bands influenced by British guitar pop music of the 1960s and 1970s...
band Blur
Blur (band)
Blur is an English alternative rock band. Formed in London in 1989 as Seymour, the group consists of singer Damon Albarn, guitarist Graham Coxon, bassist Alex James and drummer Dave Rowntree. Blur's debut album Leisure incorporated the sounds of Madchester and shoegazing...
. Other Bristol graffiti artists include Nick Walker, Sickboy
Sickboy (artist)
Sickboy is the name of a street artist from Bristol, UK, known for his temple logo and his 'Save the Youth' slogan. Sickboy moved to London in 2007 and his street art became prevalent particularly in the East End boroughs of Shoreditch and Tower Hamlets...
, Inkie
Inkie
Inkie is a London based painter and street artist, originally from Clifton, Bristol. He is cited as being part of Bristol's graffiti heritage, along with Banksy, 3D and Nick Walker.-Career:...
, Stars, Lokey, cheo
Chèo
Chèo is a form of generally satirical musical theatre, often encompassing dance, traditionally performed by Vietnamese peasants in northern Vietnam...
.
Massive Attack
Massive Attack
Massive Attack are an English DJ and trip hop duo from Bristol, England consisting of Robert "3D" Del Naja and Grant "Daddy G" Marshall. Working with co-producers, as well as various session musicians and guest vocalists, they make records and tour live. The duo are considered to be of the trip...
's Robert Del Naja
Robert Del Naja
Robert Del Naja , also known as 3D, is an English artist and musician. Initially gaining notoriety as a graffiti artist and member of the Bristol collective known as "The Wild Bunch", Del Naja went on to become a founding member of the band Massive Attack where he is active to this day.-Music:Del...
was also active as a graffiti artist with the nicknames of "3D" and "Delge" in the early 1980s. He appeared in the UK documentary called "Bombin’" alongside Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton
Wolverhampton is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands, England. For Eurostat purposes Walsall and Wolverhampton is a NUTS 3 region and is one of five boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "West Midlands" NUTS 2 region...
artist and later DJ and producer Goldie
Goldie
Clifford Joseph Price, better known as Goldie is an English electronic music artist, disc jockey, visual artist and actor. He is well known for his innovations in the jungle and drum and bass music genres, having previously gained exposure for his work as a graffiti artist...
.
Children of the Can: 25 Years of Bristol Graffiti by Felix Braun (FLX) and Steve Wright, is a book illustrating and documenting the street art scene in the city.
900,000 people visited an exhibition of Banksy's work at the Bristol Museum in 2009. In August 2011 Bristol City Council finally recognised the importance of graffiti to the city's culture by allowing an entire street to be painted by various international street artists. In August 2011 the See No Evil
See No Evil (artwork)
See No Evil is a collection of works of public art by multiple graffiti artists, located around Nelson Street, Bristol, UK. The event took place over the weekend of 20/21 August 2011 and was Europe's largest street art festival at the time...
public art event was installed in Nelson Street, transforming it into a walk-through graffiti gallery. Among other works, it includes a tall mural.
See also
- List of Bands from Bristol
- Category:Music venues in Bristol
External links
- Bristol City Council: Leisure & Culture
- Bristol graffiti & street art on FlickrFlickrFlickr is an image hosting and video hosting website, web services suite, and online community that was created by Ludicorp in 2004 and acquired by Yahoo! in 2005. In addition to being a popular website for users to share and embed personal photographs, the service is widely used by bloggers to...
- Bristol Rocks
- Arts in Bristol - Bristol City Council
- bristolsport.net