Thermals out for Bradford UK City of Culture 2025 opening show RISE amid sub-zero forecast

She’s staying positive, but what about those who need a little incentive to get out over the next few chilly weeks?

“Take part. There'll be something for everyone. Everyone won't like everything, but you would expect that, otherwise it'd be a very bland programme,” says Gulzar. “Take part in it because you can't change your mind about anything until you try and be a part of something.

“If you’re feeling a bit cold - and I'm looking out at snow right now - thermals! Get our thermals on, get our boots on, and be a part of something that is a once in a generation opportunity for us.”

The ambition of events coming up – with more to be revealed – is reflective of that opportunity. Bradford 2025 recently announced a wide variety of activities to look forward to in the fields of theatre and dance, music, visual arts and exhibitions, literature, film and food.

The first of them, taking place tonight and tomorrow is RISE, the opening event of the year in City Park and Centenary Square. The Saturday show is already sold out – Gulzar says she feels “vindicated” at this – and few tickets remain for tonight’s performance at the time of writing.

Created by Steven Frayne (the magician formerly known as Dynamo) and director Kirsty Housley, RISE is based on local people, voices and stories. Performers include a community choir led by the Friendship Choir, the Airedale Symphony Orchestra, and a multi- generational ensemble of Bradfordians aged from 12 to 65 – as well as local poet, spoken word artist and playwright Kirsty Taylor and Bradford-based writers and performers Kemmi Gill, Nabeela Ahmed and Kenzo Jae, composer and conductor Ben Crick, and composer and DJ Jae Depz.

Another highlight includes, on March 12, St George’s Hall hosting a tribute to one of the city’s most famous playwrights with The Dreams I Had: Andrea Dunbar. The work will present staged readings of selections from Dunbar’s works, celebrating the explosive talent of this once-in-a-generation writer – marking 45 years since the premiere of The Arbor and 35 years since her tragically early death.

The Dreams I Had is directed by Erica Whyman, former deputy artistic director at the Royal Shakespeare Company, with dramaturgy from Bradford-born and based Kat Rose-Martin.

Fans of The Railway Children abound in Yorkshire and from July to September, a special production will take place at rail stations seen in the beloved 1970 film version. Mike Kenny’s stage adaptation of E Nesbit’s novel premiered in 2008 but for the first time, York Theatre Royal’s Olivier Award-winning production will be taken to Keighley and Oxenhope. Exclusively for Bradford 2025, the show begins when ticketholders board a steam train at Keighley, then travel the full length of the historic railway. When they reach the end of the line at Oxenhope, there will be an auditorium in the station’s Engine Shed, purpose built for performing the story of three children forced to move from London to Yorkshire after their father is falsely imprisoned.

On April 12 and 13, the Big Brass Blowout brings together some of the best music the district offers: Yorkshire’s own Richard Hawley will join the Black Dyke Band for a special performance; BD1 Brass will score acclaimed archive film Echoes of the North; City of Bradford Brass Band will soundtrack family favourite Wallace and Gromit: The Wrong Trousers; and there will be Afrobeat from KOKOROKO (13 April), as well as an array of free events taking place at City Park across the weekend.

In September, the national Turner Prize comes to Cartwright Hall Art Gallery in Lister Park, with the winner announced in December, and work remaining on show until February 2026.

“Being able to work with the Tate to deliver the Turner Prize is phenomenal,” says Gulzar, from Keighley. “Bradford deserves to have the Turner Prize – of course it should be here! And it's brilliant that the Tate ensure that the Turner Prize is national, that every other year it is not in their venues, but in regional venues. That's necessary, because great culture, great creativity, belongs to everybody.”

The year ahead was always intended to be created mainly by and for the people of Bradford, but they are expecting plenty of visitors from beyond.

Gulzar says: “We're a very northern team that is delivering City of Culture, which I'm really proud about because it's shown that the work that's been happening across north over the last 10 to 20 years has created opportunities for creatives to learn their craft, for producers, for crew, for tech, for artists, and all of that. It feels like we're having this brilliant kind of critical mass of creativity in Bradford in 2025.”

Bradford is the fourth UK City of Culture in January 2025, selected by the Government in May 2022 from a record-breaking 20 bids, and follows Derry-Londonderry in 2013, Hull in 2017 and Coventry in 2021.

One crucial aspect of Bradford’s year hosting, for Gulzar, is the way it is focusing not just on the city but the surrounding districts – pointing out that the area is 67 per cent rural.

“We're city and district and it's the first time a City of Culture has done that,” she says. “So obviously, we're the city of Bradford, the towns of Keighley, Shipley, Bingley, Ilkley, and then all the villages that are part of these 144 square miles. We're also urban and rural, and that's the first time for a City of Culture, because we're 67 per cent rural.”

Now is the time and Bradford, adds Gulzar, “is feeling seen and it's feeling heard”.