Joshua Yon

Joshua was born in Harare (Zimbabwe) in 1997. He moved to MK in 2007 with his family and lived on Fullers Slade, which was a culture shock although there were similarities with life in Zimbabwe due to the UK’s colonial influence. He feels that part of Milton Keynes’s core identity is in maintaining its green spaces, especially coming from Zimbabwe, where there is a lot more opportunity to just be in nature. He went to school in Greenleys and then  Stantonbury (where he was first introduced to music production), made friends and found it a positive experience. As a teenager Joshua played for MK’s National League basketball team and also learned to play music, eventually producing music and playing in bands at the IF Festival, The Stables and MK Gallery, where he now works as Digital Marketing Apprentice. With friends, he hosts a successful open mic night at Midsummer Tap. He feels that the geography of Central MK is a barrier to getting a music scene going centrally, and that the creative scene in MK generally needs development and fostering, with more events and opportunities for participation to make the city more culturally impactful. He feels that MK has the capability to spearhead new technologies that will impact how we live in cities in the future (delivery robots, self-driving cars). He hopes Milton Keynes continues to like give opportunities to different cultures and different ideas “because Milton Keynes is quite a melting pot of a city”.