Tramlines and WaterBear: Backing Sheffield’s Next Wave of Artists
While Pulp, The Reytons and Kasabian top the bill at Hillsborough Park, Tramlines 2025 is just as much about the homegrown talent rising across the city. Sheffield is awash with new and established local talent with many of these new acts developing their craft at WaterBear Music College.
WaterBear students featuring at Tramlines this year include Kid Blu3, Sundress, The Tivolis, Alice Ede with the Leadmill Studio Orchestra. This is complemented by a huge range of more established local acts like bassline superstars Big Ang and K Dot or Noskøv who rose to fame following a successful appearance on The Voice.
Kid Blu3 returns to Tramlines after a career-defining year. Her single Natural Queen hit the top 3 on the UK Apple Music Hip Hop chart, powered by her scholarship at WaterBear. Sundress, are a dream pop trio bringing glittering guitar lines and soft-focus vocals to the Sunday main stage, already riding a wave of over 70,000 streams on their debut single. Over at Tramlines Fringe, The Tivolis bring their infectious energy to Devonshire Green, fresh from festival sets across the UK.
Jacob Brown of The Tivolis said:
“WaterBear have opened the door for us to make a name for ourselves on the Sheffield scene. Being able to play possibly the biggest stage we ever have is an incredible opportunity. We simply can’t wait.”
Also returning to the Tramlines programme is Alice Ede, performing with the Leadmill Studio Orchestra, a powerful collaboration that brings together WaterBear, Tracks, The Leadmill and, for the first time, the Sheffield Philharmonic Orchestra in its 80th anniversary year. Conducted by the acclaimed George Morton, the orchestra has worked closely with emerging artists from Sheffield Music School and the Tracks project to create new arrangements of original songs. The result is a genre-blending set that fuses classical scale with contemporary songwriting.
Tramlines and WaterBear have also partnered on a Tramlines funded scholarship. The first student on this programme has completed her first year studying a BA in Music Business at the Sheffield campus and is already seeing big career progress. She worked on the ‘Tons of Rock’ festival in Oslo, Norway as part of 10 WaterBear students and will have a role on site at Tramlines 2025.
It’s not just the students making noise at Tramlines. Sheffield’s own Big Ang, queen of bassline, headlines The Open Arms on Saturday as part of the Pattern and Push takeover, bringing a set that nods to her Niche roots and Top 40 success. She’s joined by a standout line-up including Prido, Kaesu & Alex FB, Leo Miyagee, Nørskov, Lavelle, Josie Wray, Namywa, Kali, DJ Kyla C, Surtees and Kid Blu3, with the whole stage hosted by JXK.
Across the weekend, Slambarz takes full control of Speakers Corner, delivering a three-day stretch of spoken word, cyphers and hard-hitting lyricism. From Just Jase, KO, RF and Reeko, to newer voices like Tinxshe, Mitchelxonly, CNC, GSD, Tlarnaa, Lex Fym, Fuego and more, it’s a platform built on realness and rooted in the city’s youth scenes.
What ties all this together is a serious commitment from Tramlines to back creative careers. Through its long-standing support for platforms like WaterBear, Pattern and Push, Under the Stars, and the Sarah Nulty Power of Music Foundation, the festival continues to invest in education, access and artistic development.
In other festival news, Tramlines is now fully sold out and the Tramlines App is now live with the full line-up, stage times and interactive map to help you plan your weekend.
More info on www.tramlines.org.uk