Tickets are now on sale for The Music is Black: A British Story, the very first exhibition at the brand new V&A East Museum. Here are the five things you need to know to get ready for your visit.
1. It opens in April
The Music is Black: A British Story opens at V&A East Museum on Saturday 18 April 2026, as the first exhibition in the new museum in the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, Stratford, London. The exhibition explores the impact of Black artistry on British music, culture and beyond.
2. It’s a multi-sensory exhibition
A celebration of resilience, creativity and joy, the exhibitionexplores how British-born Black music genres – from lovers rock to 2 tone, to jungle, trip hop, grime and beyond – have inspired and influenced lives across the UK and around the world. An evocative sound experience and multimedia installations will bring fashion, photography and musical instruments on display to life.
3. Iconic objects from the history of Black British music are on display
The exhibition is divided into four acts with over 200 objects on display. You’ll be able to see Joan Armatrading’s childhood guitar, the jacket that rapper and actor Nolay wore during filming the series Top Boy and Jme’s Super Nintendo and Mario Paint game, which he used for his first experiments with music-making in the 1990s, as well as iconic objects from the history of Black British classical music, like Black composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s conducting batons from early 1900s.
4. There are also artworks including some new commissions
The exhibition also includes works from pioneering Black British artists including Dame Sonia Boyce, Tam Joseph, Vicky Lindo and Bill Brookes and Sir Frank Bowling. On display in the first part of the exhibition, Sokari Douglas Camp’s recent sculpture Red Coats and Flags (2023), traces the links between African musical masquerades, Caribbean carnival traditions and carnival celebrations around Britain.
5. There’s a festival of events across venues
The Music is Black: A British Story will also be amplified through the V&A’s partnership with BBC Music, with BBC archival materials featured in the exhibition and a season of content across BBC channels inspired by the exhibition. The Music is Black Festival, will bring partners from the newly-formed East Bank in Stratford together for a summer festival of performances, events and live performances from the BBC, Sadlers Wells East, UAL’s London College of Fashion, and UCL East.
