By Julia Letts Last Wednesday, I watched on as Alison McKee and Shaun Evans, our two Black Country Stories volunteers from Wolverhampton had their first go at oral history interviewing. Neither of them had ever done anything like this before, but a couple of months ago, they signed up to our oral history volunteer programme […]

By Claire Wearn Martin spent the Jubilee with us in the Black Country attending as many street parties and community celebrations as possible before wondering off in the evening to a rave in The Civic! Continuing with our ongoing archive of life in the Black Country, 2012 is all about Wolverhampton and it’s satellite towns, […]

The Space featuring Multistory’s Black Country Stories launched on 1 May 2012. The Space is a joint initiative by the BBC and the Arts Council and is a new on-demand digital arts channel which will help transform the way people connect with and experience arts, music, film and give artists space to innovate and experiment. […]

On 30th April 2012, hundreds of people gathered at The Public, West Bromwich, to celebrate the launch of the Where We Dream book and film. Where We Dream tells the story of West Bromwich Operatic Society (WBOS), an amateur group that has been performing musical theatre in the Black Country since the 1930s. The book […]

Where We Dream tells the story of the West Bromwich Operatic Society (WBOS), an amateur group that has been performing musical theatre in the Black Country since the 1930s. WBOS produces ambitious shows in big regional theatres and is entirely self-supporting. It has over a hundred members and its own youth theatre section but, above […]

By Claire Wearn Still open until April 7th, New Art Gallery Walsall host Martin Parr’s interim exhibition offering an insight into the second year of Black Country Stories, commissioned and produced by Multistory. Now half way through the project we wanted to offer a taste of what Martin had captured after spending 2011 in Walsall. […]

By Claire Wearn We asked you to tell us what you think are the best things about the Black Country… whether it’s the best place to get grey peas and bacon, a saag aloo or pint of ale to the old places you worked or the best jumble sale in town… We are still asking […]

By Julia Letts 1st March, 2012 For the last six months, I have been recording memories and experiences of people who live and work in the Black Country. Many of them were photographed by Martin Parr for Black Country Stories, but my interviews don’t just cover what they are doing in the photographs. We often […]