Mama Creatives Story Slam: Love

Welcome to our annual and much loved Mama Creatives Story Slam PLUS Mother's Day celebration event. 

We will showcase women from the Mama Creatives community who will share their true and personal story relating to the theme of 'Love'.

Ten minutes each, standing in front of a microphone and you, our live audience.

PLUS this year we have poetry AND THREE incredible internationally renowned award winning musicians performing live, including the dynamic singer-songwriter Miriam Lieberman with Lara Goodridge, fiddler and harmoniser at Baby et Lulu, FourPlay String Quartet and more. 

AND this year we are expanding the love by inviting some members of the audience to share love stories or poems. THREE minutes each, in front of a mic. So if you have a great story or poem - funny, moving, random, heartfelt, interesting, and a burning desire to share it - come along and be part of the loving Mama Creatives energy. 

Special Musical Performers: Miriam Lieberman with Lara Goodridge PLUS Davey Ray Moor!

We are thrilled to include the most incredible musicians in this year's lineup. 

About Miriam Lieberman

African influences blend seamlessly with blues-infused melodies and soaring vocal harmonies in the music by Sydney singer song-writer, Miriam Lieberman. Her albums are soulful collections of stories, beautifully told through strings, African kora and Lieberman’s unmistakable voice. Amongst the themes, the songs relate a love for the natural world, stories of transformation, motherhood, love, loss and the power of imagination. The music is coloured by Miriam's journeys - from Guinea and Mali, where she studied kora  (West African harp)  to India and Latin America. These places have left an imprint on Lieberman’s musical style which she unifies with a catchiness and contemporary tone that is entirely her own. Miriam is a multiple awardee of grants such as the John Butler Seed grant, Australia Council, Create NSW, APRA, Music NSW and the Australian Songwriters Association Award. Latest album Just Transforming is a finalist for the 2021 album of the year with the Australian Folk Alliance.  Miriam and her trio have regularly featured at festivals around Australia including Woodford Folk Festival, The National Folk Festival (as the NSW showcase act), Fairbridge (WA), Yungaburra Folk Festival (QLD), Shir Madness, Blue Mountains Music Festival, Four Winds Festival, The Multicultural Festival (Canberra), Parramasala (Parramatta), Cygnet (TAS), Denmark Festival Of Voices (WA) and many more. Internationally, she has featured at The Guinean Jazz Festival, Hakodate World Music Festival (Japan), Voix des Femmes (Mali) and The Bali Spirit Festival.

Website: Miriam Lieberman 

About Lara Goodridge

As a singer and violinist, Lara has worked in many genres and areas with a vast range of experience in her 30 years as a professional musician. As well as being a member of FourPlay, Lara is “Lulu” in their ARIA nominated French band Baby et Lulu (with Abby Dobson of Leonardo’s Bride fame, and their  band of Sydney’s finest musicians) which has enjoyed much success over the past decade or so, having played at major festivals such as Womadelaide, Melbourne Festival, Adelaide Fringe, Port Fairy Music Festival and critically acclaimed sold out shows at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival. She is also one third of the Miriam Lieberman Trio, with fellow violinist Susie Bishop, which enjoys a vibrant presence amongst festivals and venues. As a session musician, she has contributed vocals and violin to many recordings and live performances of diverse genres. Some examples are Glen Hansard (The Frames, The Swell Season), Brian Wilson (Beach Boys), Bill Callahan (SMOG), Harry Manx (Canada), The Church, The Whitlams, Leonardo’s Bride, electro pop producer Josh Abrahams, folk pop singer Josh Pyke and many more. She has opened shows for The Corrs, Savage Garden, Youssou N’Dour, Ladysmith Black Mambazo and more. 

About Davey Ray Moor

Davey is a Crooner/ Piano Man / Trumpeter. He has a gentle, heartfelt presence and is an absolutely brilliant musician. Guaranteed you’ll be mesmerised. He’s a one-man band (vocals, piano, bass, trumpet ) recalling Chet Baker, David Bowie and early Tom Waits, Davey is the singer- songwriter multi-instrumentalist at the heart of Cousteau, million-selling torch-song crooners from London.Relocated to Sydney, he plays a selection from great songwriters of the last six decades mixed with originals for a night of darkly romantic popular classics remade with smoky vocals and jazz-era arrangements.

Website: Cousteau

Check CousteauX on Spotify. 

Special Giveaways - Just For You

We are also delighted to have some amazing giveaways on the night. Come along for your chance to win some coveted tickets with thanks to the SYDNEY WRITERS FESTIVAL, featuring 35 international guests and close to 300 thinkers and writers in 223 free & ticketed events

DATE: 20 May - 26 May

THEME: Take Me Away

VENUES: Carriageworks, Sydney Town Hall, City Recital Hall, The State Library of NSW and venues across Greater Sydney and the nation through the Live & Local streaming program.

Also big thanks to The Other Art Fair, where art isn't confined to convention or rule, and how you enjoy it shouldn't be either. Discover original artworks from over 120 independent artists with immersive installations, performances, DJs - and cocktails. Each fair has a brand-new lineup of artists, features, installations, and encounters. Come and experience Sydney's artworld like you never have before. 

Giveaways Include FREE ENTRY ACROSS THE WHOLE FAIR

DATE: 16 - 19 May, 2024

VENUE: White Bay Cruise Terminal, 2041 James Craig Rd, Rozelle

The Art Gallery of NSW is also giving away a family pass to this year's Archibald, Wynne and Sulman Prizes 2024

DATES: 8 June – 8 September 2024

VENUE: Art Gallery of New South Wales

The Archibald Prize for portrait painting is Australia’s most celebrated and democratic – sometimes controversial – art award. Open to any artist living in Australia or New Zealand, since 1921 it has reflected the unique experiences of the people who live in this region, highlighting figures from all walks of life.

As equally exciting for the diverse entries they attract from across the country, the Wynne Prize is for landscape painting of Australian scenery, or figure sculpture, while the Sulman Prize is for subject painting, genre painting or a mural project.

About Our Story Slammers 

Jennifer Reid

 

Creative Director of Jennifer Reid Design Studio, Jennifer is a surface pattern designer, artist and teacher specialising in creating art for interiors, fabric and wallpaper. Jennifer lives in a beautiful semi-rural town on the outskirts of Sydney Australia, with her husband and two kids, who are the loves of her life.

But after a long battle with many health challenges from the age of 39, Jennifer rediscovered her other long lost love - Art! With her mantra 'Never Stop Dreaming' and her creative spirit, Jennifer has used her experience of art as therapy to create a career she loves, making art for interior designers and home renovators, as well as teaching tertiary interior & graphic design students about 'all things design'.

Jennifer thrives on long walks in nature to inspire her work, mainly focusing on the beauty of Australian florals and birds, sparking joy one creation at a time. It is the creative process that she says continues to be her healing balm.

Her story is about survival, finding her long lost love - art - and using it to live her very best creative life.

Website: Jennifer Reid
Instagram: Jennifer Reid Design

Martine Springer 

Martine is an intuitive contemporary artist, who explores her internal life through visual expression.

Her creative journey began with photography at Sydney College of the Arts and later she became enamoured with the painting process. Martine has developed her technique through lessons with local artists. Gabbi Kitchener, in particular, an Australian born artist & mentor, has been a huge inspiration. Martine now works with Gabbi in her business, the inspiring creative community Art of Flow.

A deep spiritual connection to nature influences her artistic practice which is connected through the various healing modalities she has studied.

Martine describes her inspiration as flowing intuitively, tapping into an intangible energy with complete trust, just allowing the paint and the brush to guide her along a path.

Many of her paintings are reflective of the personal journey she has taken in her path of healing.

Martine's story is titled Soulmates and is an inspiring love story spanning a lifetime, maybe more. 

Website: Martine Springer

Instagram: The HeART of Change

Lou Steer

Lou Steer is a performance poet. Her performance highlights include performing to 100,000 people at Newtown Festival. She has performed at many festivals including Sydney Fringe Festival, Newcastle Fringe Festival, Winter Magic Festival, Mothertongue, Woman Scream International Festival, Cooks River Festival and Beams Festival. 

In 2023, she was awarded a grant by Inner West Council to write and produce her hour long play A Pocketful of Fierce Violets, which she performed at EDGE Sydenham and Sydney Fringe Festival. She was the convenor of Caravan Slam, the largest poetry slam in Sydney’s inner west, from 2015 – 2018. 

Since 2023, she has co presented and produced Close to Home on Radio Skid Row. Her poems are widely anthologised and have been translated into Chinese and published in New York and New Zealand by World Poetry Movement.

Lou will share a selection of poems about Love. 

Freya Wolf

Freya is a pleasure activist, writer, speaker, and sensual embodied dance facilitator. She’s ridden the waves of many movements, from disability rights to safety and inclusion, while mothering, dating, relating, and friending and marrying along the way, alongside a complicated dance with blindness. She’s passionate about our connection with body, pleasure, earth, and community. Her fierce love of cats has sustained her through most of life’s twists and turns.

Freya's story is about the power of connecting with embodied pleasure and the radical love and liberation that can be found in connection with our bodies and our pleasure.

Website: Freya Wolf

Instagram: Embodied by Dance

About Our Venue: The Bellevue Hotel

We will be hosting this incredible event upstairs at The Bellevue hotel. Come a bit earlier and enjoy dinner and drinks in this lovely light filled space. The menu offers a range of excellent tasty pub classics, including $20 burgers on Tuesday night, with Happy Hour from 5pm – 7 pm. Forget making dinner, bring a friend or your mama posse for a perfect night out. 

PLEASE NOTE: These events have all sold out in the past, please get your ticket sooner than later to ensure your spot. 

At Mama Creatives we have organised an amazing year of events, online and offline - we can't wait to see you!