On the 3rd of July, the 13th ‘Sharrow Festival’ was once again held on ‘Mount Pleasant Park’ and continued its reputation as one of Sheffield’s best local festivals with over 7000 people attending to enjoy various music stages and nearly 100 stalls providing a wide selection of foods, crafts and information.

In these two reports produced and presented by Erini Apostolidou for Sheffield Live, we take a closer look at some of the events and people around the festival.

Part 1: Evelyn Joseph presents a local project for sexual health awareness in the BME communities. Ronin Barkshire explains why the extraction of oil from tar sands has to stop and how the struggle to achieve this is connected with saving energy here in the UK. Georgina Valentine gives us an insight on the beneficial effects of meditation. Usua, Maira and their friends tell us about their expectations from the festival and stress the need to bring famous bhangra musicians and performers.

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Part 2: A compilation of music performed live at the festival. From rap to gypsy and from a cappella singing to karaoke. Don’t miss young Pallav singing the Jacksons 5 hit “I’ll be there”

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SHEFFIELD: Forgemasters

The biggest casualty of the recent budget in Sheffield has been the cancellation of the £80million loan to the city’s steel manufacturer Forgemasters. The loan was approved in March when the Labour government’s business secretary Peter Mandelson came down to the city of steel and made the announcement.

The loan was to be spent on constructing a 15,000 tonne forging press to make components for nuclear reactors. This plan would have created around400 jobs in the city. Once completed, the forging press, was expected to attract international business as the demand for heavy nuclear forgings is estimated to triple by 2020, up to 70,000 tonnes. There are currently five companies, capable of producing large nuclear components, and only one possessing a forging press as large as the one planned for Sheffield.

This podcast takes a look at how the city responded to the decision, featuring interviews with the city’s Labour MPs, Leader of the City Council, Lib Dem Councillor Paul Scriven, Doug Patterson, Unite’s regional representatives and locals who signed the petition asking the government to rethink its decision.

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SHEFFIELD: City Of Culture

‘City of Culture 2013′ aims to build on the success of Liverpool’s year as European Capital of Culture 2008, which had significant social and economic benefits for the area. The winning city will be one that is able to deliver a substantial programme of cultural activity which leads to a demonstrable step-change in their area, and a lasting legacy. The four finalist cities are: Sheffield, Birmingham, Derry/Londonderry and Norwich.

The Sheffield bid aims to position a whole generation of young people in the driving seat for culture. The programme will uncover, nurture, inspire and showcase the talent and energy of Sheffield’s young people as the city’s emerging cultural asset. The city will become the stage for their cultural programme in which many elements are produced by and with young people and will connect with the wider generations of Sheffield.

We wish to engage everyone in the city in creating, making and performing cultural activities in 2013. Our people won’t just watch culture, they will create it themselves and produce an original, authentic, interactive and international programme.

This podcasts talks to Council Cllr Paul Scriven on the city’s bid to become UK’s first City of Culture and first aired on Sheffield Live! 93.2FM on June 16, 2010.

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SHEFFIELD: City Of Sanctuary

City of Sanctuary is a movement to build a culture of hospitality for refugees and asylum-seekers. In 2007, with the support of the City Council, Sheffield became the UK’s first ‘City of Sanctuary’ for asylum-seekers and refugees—a city that takes pride in the welcome it offers to people in need of safety.More than 100 local organisations including schools, community projects, student groups, and most of Sheffield’s main faith communities have now joined the movement.

This podcast (Broadcast on June 16, 2010) is a report on Sheffield’s status as the City of Sanctuary for asylum seekers and refugees. The podcast features interviews with Sarah Elridge, development officer for Sheffield City of Sanctuary; Lib Dem Cllr Shaffaq Mohammad; Rodrigo Edema from Uganda, Tendero from Zimbabwe and Jinan from Lebanon, who all have successfully progressed from asylum seekers to refugee status.

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On the 29th of March, a talented bunch of writers from across the UK got together to present and perform a new radio show featuring a unique collection of live poetry and music. The show was recorded ‘as live‘ at ‘The Red House’ pub on Solly street and produced by wordsandthings.co.uk in association with Sheffieldlive!

This evening was conceived by the ‘Bard of Broomhill’ otherwise known as Ruth Grimsley, who presented her unique and unmissable readings along with co-host Paul Amber.

The show also featured amazing performances by Richard Faulkner, Mr & Mrs Mills, Graham Stevens, Rex Davies, Anxious Andrews and Sue Wallis

And if you fancy getting involved with future poetry or writing events, remember to check out wordsandthings.co.uk or email us here at info@sheffieldlive.org

Update: The next ‘Words and Things: Open Mic Roadshow’ will be taking place on June 8th upstairs at the Harlequin pub on Nursery Street

The Poetry Show (90 mins) Warning: Contains Some Adult Language

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The UK general election was held on the 6th of May 2010 and turned out to be one of the most tightly fought and important this country has seen in generations. Although the Conservatives won the largest number of votes and seats, they still fell short of the 326 seats needed to have an overall majority. The first time this has happened since 1974 and only the second time since the ‘Second World War’ that a UK general election has returned a hung parliament.

Sheffield’s Full General Election Results

Sheffield’s Full Local Election Results

On a local level, Sheffield Live! was there every step of the way. Our team of reporters and presenters broadcasting both the ‘General Election’ & ‘Local Council’ results; along with all the interviews and comments from the people that matter. We started at 1am in the morning and didn’t stop delivering the news to you till 6pm that evening.

Our reporting team throughout the event were: Paul Gregory, Sangita Basudev, Charlotte Dobson, Amna Kaleem, Mickey Conn, Ross Drayton & Simon Thake. Below you can hear some of the highlights from their coverage.

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The Night-time Shift: 1am till 6am
Presented by Paul Gregory

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The Breakfast Show: 6am till 9am
Presented by Ross Drayton and Simon Thake

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The Afternoon Show: 12pm till 3pm
Presented by Sangita Basudev & Mickey Conn

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The Late Afternoon Show: 5pm till 6pm
Presented by Amna Kaleem

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Adobe Photoshop is the industry’s leading digital image editing software. It is the perfect creative tool for designing and manipulating images for print layouts, web publishing, multimedia, video, photography and visually expressing your creative ideas. The ‘Showroom’ in partnership with Sheffield Live! is offering two weekend courses in May to improve your skills in this amazing software package. These sessions will take place in the new Sheffield Live! computer suite and participants will gain expert tuition in the core elements of Adobe Photoshop CS4

Weekend One: Level 1: Beginners
Saturday 15th & Sunday 16th of May
10.00am - 5.00pm

The course will be filled with a number of hands-on tutorials which you’ll work through with help from your tutor. Some of the features you’ll learn are:

• Navigating your way through the Photoshop CS4 workspace.
• How to use ‘auto correction’ tools to fix common problems with tones, contrasts and colours.
• How to crop and resize images.
• How to use healing brushes to fix blemishes within a photograph
• Understand the basic use of layers.
• Adding text to photographs.
• How to easily apply filters to create stunning special effects.
• How to save and print your images.

Tutor: Peter Beeston
Price: £125 (£110 conc)

Weekend Two: Level 2: Intermediary
Saturday 22nd & Sunday 23rd of May
10.00am - 5.00pm

The course will be filled with a number of hands-on tutorials which you’ll work through with help from your tutor. Some of the features you’ll learn are:

• Navigating your way through the Photoshop workspace
• The benefits of working in a more ‘Non-Destructive’ style
• How using filter and pixel masks can give you more control over your work
• How adjustment layers can fix most common problems
• How to create smart objects
• How to ‘touch up’ photographs like the professionals
• Understanding how to paint in all various ‘colour modes’
• How to use a ‘vanishing point’ to edit in perspective
• How to use Photoshop as a 3D editing tool

Tutor: Peter Beeston
Price: £125 (£110 conc)

Places can be booked through the showroom box office on 0114 2757727
or online www.showroomworkstation.org.uk

Sheffield Live’s very own Lady Stardust and DJ Deb step out from the studio and on to the floor to present an ecelctic sound. You can catch the Underground Cliche team performing at The Raynor Lounge, University of Sheffield Students Union on 27 February from 8pm - 1am and all for only £2.50 for the whole night. All the proceeds go to Sheffield Live! So come on down and get on to the dance floor. Have a great night and support your favourite community radio station, Sheffield Live! What else could you possibily want on a Saturday night? Cake I hear you say! Well guess what? There will be some of them on sale too!

……….where radio folk put on aprons and take to the stove

Harry’s prawn curry, Irini’s spinach pie and Dale’s burritos meet Simon’s lentil stew, Paul’s chili and Jill’s wakes cakes on a night set up to share our favourite dishes with you!

This menu is not complete, so do join us on the 4^th of March to meet the faces behind the voices and find out what we have been cooking.

On the decks will be Graham Marshall (Spirit of the Wapentake), Chris Welch (Sounds Like this), Kevin Resley (Walk a mile in my shoes) and S. Lee Price (Vancouver Manouever).