Back To Africa Centre Party

Music legend Jazzie B plays the Ipswich welcome back weekend, as part of Ipswich Arts Centre Back to the Africa Centre events.

A musical pioneer, Jazzie B needs no introduction. Soul II Soul's classic tracks Fair Play, Keep On Movin' and Back to Life (However Do You Want Me), propelled Soul II Soul into the mainstream with a groundbreaking fusion of London's sound system and breakbeat culture, with hip-hop, house and soul. 

In 1987 the Soul II Soul sound system moved into an unknown venue in the centre of London called The Africa Centre. The reason for choosing the venue was, in the words of Jazzie B, that it had a “gallery balcony and a sprung dance floor”.  

Tonight in Arlington’s, Ipswich’s own venue with a balcony and sprung dancefloor, we celebrate 35 years since Jazzie took sound system culture to the mainstream and changed the course of British music.

Jazzie is joined on the decks by Noise of Art founder and international DJ Ben Osborne, while other events in Arlington’s celebrate the Welcome Back Ipswich weekend with  Back To the Africa Centre, John Ferguson’s Black Cowboys and Museum of The Environment.