Steven Frayne: 'I'm putting the magic into the hands of the people of Bradford in 2025'

Heralding the official start of Bradford’s year as UK City of Culture, RISE is an open-air spectacular taking place next Friday and Saturday (Jan 10/11), directed by award- winning theatre director Kirsty Housley with Frayne as creative lead.

The event will transform City Park and Centenary Square into the stage, celebrating the people and places that make Bradford magic.

“I’m helping Kirsty add some magical touches to this amazing spectacle she’s been creating. We’ve been finding incredible talent from Bradford. I wanted to shine a light on important people in the community – the type of people who helped me when I was starting out doing magic."

One of the places he spent most of his teenage years, and says in many respects he wouldn’t have had a magic business without it, is the MAPA Youth Club on the West Bowling Council Estate.

“I used to go there a lot of times after school. It was a place young people could go to be safe until their parents got back from work. It was the guys there that introduced me to the Prince’s Trust that helped me get my business as a magician off the ground. They nurture a lot of talent there,” says Frayne.

"There’s a lot more places like that in Bradford than you think – they are melting pots for incredible talent and incredible stories and we want to put them on this stage. Not just the performers but the people who have helped give them a platform to rise up and shine.

“I am that kid that lived in the council estate who wanted to be more than what people expected me to be. Magic is ultimately the ability to get someone to believe in something but the best magic you can ever do is to give someone the ability to believe in themselves,” he says.

Frayne likens the RISE show to the opening ceremony of the Olympics.

"That’s how I am looking at it. It’s got to go big and be spectacular.

"Generally in my performances I am quite low key because I like the magic to speak for itself but in this it has the bells and whistles of a sense of theatre but it’s done in a way that only the people of Bradford could do it.”

The creative team has been assembled to produce the show with local people, voices and stories at its heart. Performers include a community choir led by the Friendship Choir, the Airedale Symphony Orchestra, and a multi-generational community ensemble of Bradford residents aged from 12 to 65.

“It’s an army of people who have brought this to life all who come from Bradford who are coming together to do something as a community.

"Magic was the one thing in my life that I could use to bring people together. Most of my life growing up I was in a fractured household. It wasn’t the easiest environment I grew up in. My dad was in jail.

"I always felt quite isolated and misunderstood growing up and I probably didn’t do myself any favours becoming a magician – it wasn’t the coolest thing to get involved in. I will never forget that I am and will always be one of the young people in the city who felt invisible for years and now luckily people see me.

“But once I realised for the first time in my life I had something that would bring people together then I have never looked back and I think this another opportunity to do that – I am helping Kirsty and the team with this incredible show to add magic into everything they are already doing in a way only I could. I am putting the magic into the hands of the people of Bradford. Ultimately you don’t need to be Dynamo to do magic.”

Frayne is tightlipped about whether or not he will be performing at RISE.

"You will definitely see some of my magic,” he says cryptically. “I can’t say too much at this stage – magic is all about the element of surprise.

"We’ve worked with a young child actor who is playing a younger me. We are going to take people back in time and then bring them back to the future. But ultimately this is the people’s show and I feel lucky top be a part of it.”

Frayne is clearly very excited and passionate to be involved in Bradford 2025.

“I would champion Bradford forever – I love the place. I wouldn’t be where I am without it. I am a walking advertisement of what good can come out of the city.

"I want this to open people’s eyes to what the people of Bradford, particularly the young people, can achieve. Not just as musicians and dancers but in how they help their neighbours or their community, inspiring people, keeping people off the streets and on the right path – that’s magic.

"Magic is a feeling you get when you realise that maybe the impossible is possible.”

From a troubled upbringing on a council estate in Braford Frayne’s career has taken him from performing street magic to helming award-winning TV programmes, sell-out arena shows and travelling the world all under the pseudonym Dynamo.

But a year ago after a number of health issue and the loss of his beloved grandparents he made a massive decision – to kill off the persona that had made him famous by being buried alive on television in a show named ‘Dynamo is Dead’ .

“I started to feel too much pressure to live up to being Dynamo partly because there’s a real person behind that mask – Steven the kid from Bradford that wasn’t confident enough to perform under his own name.

"But looking back it was the people of Bradford who were the first people to embrace me and they didn’t embrace me as Dynamo they embraced me as Steven – they used to call me Magic Steve – and going back there I don’t feel I have to be anything other than what I am.”

He says he is now, for the first time, fully embracing who he really is and it feels right to bring that back to Bradford where it all began to relaunch his magic career as Steven Frayne.

"Ever since I dug myself out of my own grave a year ago I left a big part of me in that ground and I wanted to start afresh. I genuinely feel I am seeing magic through new eyes for the first time and it feels like the beginning of my career all over again and I feel incredibly lucky to be able to do that wherever it takes me.

“Bradford is where my heart is and has always been a hidden gem; a place filled with magic and wonderful people. The city is often forgotten by the rest of the country, and I believe it’s time to shine a spotlight on our future dreams. Having seen first-hand the hard work, passion and commitment of the local community, I really believe that this is our time and it is something I am incredibly proud to be involved in – this is something really special.”

For more information and tickets visit bradford2025.co.uk