Comedian, mathematician and poet Harry Baker is Unashamed
Part poet, part stand-up comedian – he’s also a mathematician and writer – Harry Baker will be appearing in Cambridge in the new year.
After his previous solo tour was extended three times due to popular demand/a global pandemic, and fresh from a sell-out run at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe, former World Poetry Slam champion Harry Baker is bringing his new show Unashamed – described as his “most heartfelt, playful, unashamedly Harry Baker-y show yet” – to the Junction in January.
“I am a performance poet, and have done stand-up comedy as well,” explains Harry, 30, “so this show is a combination of the two, and throughout lockdown I did what I could in terms of online gigs, and then last year there was a lot of socially distanced performances.
“There was a sense of being in the room together, but actually it’s only being back on this tour where there’s a genuine sense of connection in the room where you realise how much I’ve craved that, or how much audiences feel like they’re excited to be back in those spaces. So I’m absolutely loving it.”
Unashamed also includes a Chris Evans ‘diss track’. “I ran the London Marathon last year dressed as a massive falafel,” recalls Harry, who describes Cambridge as “one of the best audiences and one of my favourite gigs” on his previous tour.
“It was a fundraising thing and on his [Chris Evans’] show his co-hosts were talking about it and he just shot it down, and it felt like a shame that I was trying to do this fun thing and he just wasn’t having any of it. So in the show I talk about this story and how I ended up running the marathon as a falafel, but that involves getting a massive backing track and cussing Chris Evans whilst dressed as a falafel.”
Harry continues: “The title [Unashamed] in one sense is about being your full self, and so for me I studied maths at uni, I’ve done poetry on the side, and then the two kind of flipped – so the last 10 years I’ve been able to be a full-time performer and have a bit of an interest in maths.
“So it’s partly trying to embrace those two sides of my brain and my life that people often see as separate. But I think what it has become is a celebration of being your full self, in terms of that emotional spectrum as well, so I think it’s the most out-and-out silly I’ve been at points.
“There’s a full-on German pop song that I wrote six months into lockdown that is really fun to perform, and people respond to, but also there’s me talking about how I started going to therapy this year for the first time and acknowledging that actually, in terms of my mental health, I’ve massively struggled.
“So to be able to hold both of those extremes in the same space, it feels like that is – both as a person and as a performer – me trying to not hide away from either of those sides of my personality.”
Since becoming the youngest ever World Poetry Slam champion in 2012, the last 10 years have seen Harry perform all over the world, from a sold-out Dubai Opera House alongside Simon Armitage and Carol Ann Duffy, to becoming a festival favourite at the likes of Glastonbury, Latitude and Bestival.
Harry’s work has been shared on TED.com, and he has also become a regular contributor to BBC Radio 2’s Pause for Thought. He has featured on The Russell Howard Hour as part of the UK’s leading comedy-rap-jazz duo Harry and Chris, and more recently he appeared on the BAFTA-winning Sky TV show Life & Rhymes alongside Benjamin Zephaniah.
[Read more: Harry Hill: ‘I’ll leave them punch-drunk with a very silly show’, Comedian Olga Koch bringing her ‘roller coaster romcom’ of a show to Cambridge]
Harry will be coming to Cambridge Junction (J2) on Friday, January 20. Tickets are £14.50 and are available at junction.co.uk. For more on the versatile entertainer, go to harrybaker.co.
