Princess Katarina ROARing Voices Patron, has a passion for helping people and to share her knowledge about the environment and other causes.

Gaia Vince is an award-winning science writer and author and journalist (the Guardian, New Scientist and BBC), Anthropocene researcher, global strategist, traveller, broadcaster, analyst, and speaker, who is particularly interested in the interaction between human systems and the Earth’s planetary systems.  Gaia also presents documentaries for radio and television and held senior editorial positions at the science journals Nature, Nature Climate Change, and New Scientist magazine.  She is also the founding member of the Climate migration Council, and a National Oceans 

Sonja Linden is an award winning playwright whose plays have been produced in theatres across the UK and the USA.  Inspired by her seven year writing residency at Freedom from Torture, she founded iceandfire theatre in 2003  to bring to public attention  some of the  stories of the refugee clients she worked with in her Write to Life Project.  Among her current projects is Small Boats, an adaptation for stage in Sonja’s translation of a recent highly acclaimed French novel, narrated by a French female coastguard who failed to save a boatful of migrants. A work of fiction, it is inspired by a real event in the English Channel in November 2021

Blånid is an Irish singer-songwriter, who has garnered plays on BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 6, RTÉ Radio 1 and more; TV appearances on RTÉ 1’s The Late Late Show, All Arts TV & PBS; and featured vocalist slots on both Netflix’s ‘The Witcher: Nightmare of the Wolf’, and ‘Warhammer Age of Sigmar: Realms of Ruin’ video game. After her 2023 UK tour this year she showcased at Whelan’s Ones to Watch, made her solo debut on RTÉ TV 1’s Fingal Sessions, was hand-selected by the prestigious Ivors Academy for 

Annu Sodipe tours with the Chineke Orchestra. In 2023 Annu performed with the BBC Concert Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall. She has also performed with Stormzy at the 2023 Brit Awards and with the Afrobeat artist, Asaka, at the O2 Arena.

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Gemma Storr most recently the featured composer on Furies’s ‘Ecotales’; Cowbois (Royal Shakespeare Company);  A Pacifists Guide to the War on Cancer (Complicité) UK/International tour); Ugly Chief (Battersea Arts Centre/CTN Tour); Snappy Operas (Mahogany Opera Group/UK Tour); American Idiot the Musical (Mountview School of Theatre Arts); The Gentlest Work (By Jove Theatre); Free Women (Folkestone Quarterhouse); Key to Return (BrightSparksP21). 

Royal Society of Arts Team Event 17 May 2024

Ellie Verkerk

Ellie Verkerk Music Director, Pianist and Music Arrangements, is an acclaimed musician combining her skills as a performer, multi- instrumentalist, and orchestral musician. She has performed with Bristol Old Vic, Punchdrunk, and in the West End production of Six and was the lead pianist for Lea Salonga’s Dream Again Tour (Royal Albert Hall) as well as being the Assistant Music Director for the UK Tour of The Color Purple. Ellie performs in a variety of orchestras and rock bands and teaches both nationally and internationally. https://www.ellieverkerk.com/

Cindy Forde

Cindy Forde is an acclaimed author and thought leader with over 25 years dedicated to transforming our relationship with Earth. Winner of the Change Champion Award in 2023 alongside leaders such as David Attenborough for her children’s book ‘Bright New World,’ she is the founder of Planetari, pioneering Earth-led education, which was recognised by Climate Positive Award at UN COP28. Previously MD of Blue Marine Foundation and CEO of Cambridge Science Centre, she is guest faculty at University of Cambridge’s Homerton Change Makers programme. She serves on the Steering Committee of She Changes Climate and is currently writing a book on colonisation and climate change. https://cindyforde.world/

Antoinette Vermilye

Antoinette Vermilye, co-founder of the Gallifrey Foundation. The Gallifrey Foundation identifies collaborative opportunities to tackle ocean conservation issues; supports social enterprise, applying tangential strategies to solve human and environmental problems. Antoinette is an expert in her field and can educate and interest an audience with such energy that draws you in so that you want to hear more and become involved. She is passionate about the complex interrelationships of the ocean plastics, gender and overfishing on social injustice, human health and the environment. She will be talking about how the Majority World/ Global South is affected by climate change, particularly from a female perspective and what she thinks we can do to help. https://gallifrey.foundation/

Felicity Bucklandl

Felicity Bucklandl completed her formal operatic at the Royal Northern College of Music and English National Opera’s Opera Works programme. She has sung with the Royal Opera House, ENO, Opera North, Grange Park Opera, and appeared at the BBC Proms. She is a longstanding tutor at Blackheath Conservatoire, leads opera workshops in schools and care settings around the UK, and is outspoken on issues of equality, diversity, and inclusivity within the classical music industry. https://www.youtube.com/@FizzBuckland/videos

Adenike Adewale

Adenike Adewale is a singer-songwriter who recently appeared, to great acclaim, as Whitney Houston in Whitney: Queen of the Night in theatres and arenas both nationally and internationally, including sold-out shows at the Royal Albert Hall and London Palladium. In 2020 Adenike was semi- finalist on The Voice, UK (2020), coached by WILL.I.AM.

Juliette Champaud

Juliette Champaud is attending a PhD programme, researching the development of spontaneous brain activity patterns, the building blocks for consciousness and higher level processes, in the human newborn. Juliette has strong concerns for environmental issues, and is cognisant that the environment needs urgent action now. Juliette would like to be a part Voices For Change – to make a difference! She has worked for a marine conservation NGO in Zanzibar, Tanzania where they are interacting with the local community to protect precious marine ecosystem. Juliette has to come face-to- face with the challenges of implementing conservation practices in the Global South in different cultures and traditions; and where the ever-expanding tourism sector is generating large proportions of plastic and other pollution.

Penelope Chalmers

Penelope Chalmers has performed many major roles with the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, English National Opera and Scottish Opera. She has also sung in major opera houses in Geneva, Koblenz, Frankfurt, Berlin, Seoul, Adelaide, and San Francisco and is the co-director of the Leran Music Festival in the South of France, established in 2014. Retired International Opera Singer

Tina Carr

Tina Carr is a London-based jazz singer who walked away from a professional life working in human rights and freedom of expression; and threw herself into music-making. Since then, Tina has sung in London at Green Note, Hoxton Hall, Toulouse Lautrec, Vortex, Piano Smithfield, Max Klub in Slovenia and Jazz Café Alto in Amsterdam. As a duo with pianist/composer Matt Robinson, performing sell-out gigs at intimate Soho venues, and recently launched her debut album, “Songs for Curly” with her band at the Actors Church, Covent Garden. With her warm, authentic vibe, Tina moves through ballads, swing and be-bop, singing from experience, reaching out to her audience and telling stories through songs old, new and unusual. https://www.instagram.com/adenike_music/?next=%2Faneediaz05%2Ffeed%2F&hl=bn

Sarah Wilkinson

Sarah Wilkinson is a highly experienced pianist, vocal coach, repetiteur, and piano accompanist. She is the Director of Highbury Youth Choirs, Assistant Director to both Eclectic Voices and Highbury Opera Theatre and has performed at prestigious venues throughout the UK and abroad including the Queen Elizabeth Hall and St John Smith’s Square and on BBC Radio 4. https://sarahwilkinson.uk/

Lynda Olivia

Lynda Olivia Nwabudike recently demonstrated her vocal agility at the US Embassy in London singing opera in her native language. Other notable performances include her recent portrayal of Mimi La Bohéme and the title role in Anna Bolena for the Postgraduate Opera Scenes at Trinity Laban Opera. Lynda received the Opera Europa Eve Kleinitz Scholarship; was the recipient of the Peter Harris Scholarship and the Kathleen Trust Scholarship at Trinity Laban Opera.

Sam Brown

Sam Brown is one of the UK’s most versatile cordophonists, known for his sensitive style and ensemble blend. Trained at the Royal College of Music, he has performed at major venues including the Wigmore Hall, London and the Konzerhaus, Vienna. Sam performs early music through to contemporary fingerpicking and jazz. Sam works with many singers and ensembles including Dame Emma Kirkby DBE and Maria Lys, duo Fair Oriana and ensemble Dowland’s Foundry. He also directs Dowland Youth Works, an early music scheme for teenagers. http://www.sambrownmusic.org/

Annu Sodipe

Annu Sodipe incorporates her classical training and her love for jazz with elements of Yoruba culture. She has toured with the Chineke! Orchestra, the first professional orchestra to be comprised of majority Black & ethnically diverse musicians and, in 2023, performed with the BBC Concert Orchestra at the Royal Albert Hall. She has also performed with Stormzy at the 2023 Brit Awards and with the Afrobeat artist, Asaka, at the O2 Arena.

Germana Stella La Sorsa

Germana Stella La Sorsa is an Italian London-based singer and storyteller and her voice has been described as “powerful when required, but also capable of great variety and soulful subtlety” by Jazz Journal. Both eclectic and versatile, Germana has performed in the most iconic London jazz venues including Ronnie Scott’s, The Spice of Life and Oliver’s Jazz Bar. She has also performed internationally, playing at Jazz festivals such as the Al Bustan International Festival, Lebanon, Taranto Jazz Festival and Ceglie Jazz Open Festival, Italy. Germana released her debut album ‘Vapour’ in 2021, and melds her disparate influences in her second studio album, ‘Primary Colours’, released in January 2024. https://www.instagram.com/germanastellals/