Kayo Chingonyi is a fellow of the Complete Works programme for diversity and quality in British Poetry and the author of two pamphlets, Some Bright Elegance (Salt, 2012) and The Colour of James Brown’s Scream (Akashic, 2016). His first full-length collection, Kumukanda, was published in June 2017 by Chatto & Windus, and has just won the £30,000 Dylan Thomas Prize. He was Associate Poet at the Institute of Contemporary Arts from Autumn 2015 to Spring 2016 and is currentky Burgess Fellow at the University of Manchester. He is now poetry editor for The White Review. Kayo is also an emcee, producer, and DJ and regularly collaborates with musicians and composers both as a poet and a lyricist. He holds down a fortnightly show on Netil Radio called Keep It 100 which is a celebration of groove and feeling in music spanning from rockabilly ditties to afrobeats (with regular forays into R&B, Hip Hop, and House).

Chingonyi will be taking part in The Centre for New Writing’s panel discussion The Future of the Book