The BBC and V&A East Just Committed an Entire Year to Black British Music

There is something significant about the fact that V&A East Museum, a brand new institution in one of London's most historically layered boroughs, chose Black British music as the story it wanted to tell first.

The Music Is Black: A British Story is the inaugural exhibition at V&A East, covering 125 years of Black music-making in Britain. The BBC has built an entire complementary programme around it, spanning Radio 1, 1Xtra, Radio 2, Radio 3, Radio 6 Music, BBC Two, BBC Four, iPlayer, Sounds, and local radio across all 39 stations. The scale of it is genuinely hard to ignore.

Some of the highlights are worth paying attention to beyond the headline. Radio 6 Music's Rave Forever series runs every Friday throughout August, dedicating each week to a different decade of Black British dancefloor culture, from lovers rock and dub through to grime, UK funky, and dubstep. Jamz Supernova and SHERELLE are among the presenters holding it down.

Radio 1Xtra's mixtape, mixed by Shortee Blitz and Beat A Maxx, pulls together over 200 artists across 60 minutes and 100 years of music. On 28 June, Trevor Nelson and DJ Spoony host a live show at the Hackney Empire featuring the Chineke! Orchestra alongside Alison Limerick, Courtney Pine, and Rhoda Dakar among others.

The East Bank festival runs from April to November at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, with four live weekends between June and September. BBC Introducing brings Welsh rapper Mace the Great, indie soul duo MRCY, and alternative R&B artist Becky Sikasa to the launch event, which feels exactly right. A season about legacy that makes room for what is coming next.

For up and coming artists, this is worth paying attention to beyond just the programming. A season of this scale, with presenters like Jamz Supernova, SHERELLE, Kenny Allstar, and DJ Target actively curating and championing music, is an open window. BBC Introducing is already embedded in the exhibition launch, which means the infrastructure for discovery is very much switched on right now.

If your music sits anywhere within the spectrum of Black British sound, this is the moment to make sure the right people can hear it. Submit through BBC Introducing, get your music to the presenters directly through their social platforms, and pay attention to what each show is actually covering.

Targeted, genuine outreach will always land better than a blanket email to a generic inbox.

The full programme is available at bbc.co.uk/themusicisblack from now.