Linda Joy Burke

Performances and talks are interactive, with audience members participating in a facilitated percussion experience with both voice and instruments.

"I believe that through deep, personal exploration and integration of the arts into our lives, in whatever form - "art" presents itself to us, we are able to enhance our growth and inform our knowing about the world and ourselves more completely. This allows us to heal wounds, and create a culture that bridges the best and worst of our history with the best and worst of our possible destiny."

Performance poet, writer, percussionist and amateur photographer, Linda Joy Burke is a 2002 Distinguished Black Marylander Award recipient for Art from Towson University’s Office of Diversity, a 2004 Coca Cola Company/NFAA Distinguished Teacher in the Arts nominee, a 2004 Poetry for the People Baltimore Legacy Award recipient, a 2008 Fox 45 Champions of Courage nominee, and a 2007 Columbia Festival of the Arts Poetry Slam winner and a 2013 Howard County Women’s Hall of Fame inductee. She is currently consulting editor to Little Patuxent Review literary and art anthology and former Maryland State Arts Council Coordinator for the Poetry Out Loud National Recitation Competition.

Burke’s poetry, fiction, op-ed columns, reviews, profiles and feature stories have appeared in numerous publications including: The Little Patuxent Review, Obsidian II Black Literature in Review, Beltway: An On-Line Quarterly, Passager, Healing Design; Practical Feng Shui For Gracious Living, Thy Mothers’ Glass Poems for Mothers and Daughters, Gargoyle 54, When Divas Laugh: The Diva Squad Poetry Collective, Maryland Voices -the 9/11 Project, Poetry for Peace; An Anthology of Maryland Poets on War, Peace & Social Justice, The Road Less Taken - The Saint Valentine Sunday Poetry Marathon 2001 CD Maryland Institute College of Art, Word Up Baltimore CD, Carolyn Malachi’s Revenge of the Smart Chics 2: Ambitious Gods CD, Achieve and Spectrum both publications of the National Association of Black Accountants, Women to Women Magazine, Black Issues Book Review, Jambalaya Magazine, The Columbia Flier, The Baltimore Sun, The Washington Star News Weekender where her first poems were published when she was 16, and the Howard County Times where she started out as a stringer over 35 years ago. In September of 2011 she released the first in a series of Chapbook collections – Moods, Minds and Multitudes (somewhere between there and here) a collection of photos and poetry.

She has performed and given readings or talks sponsored by: The Howard County Poetry and Literature Society, Columbia Festival of the Arts, The Baltimore Book Festival, The Howard County and Enoch Pratt Free Libraries, The Maryland Humanities Council, The National Black Women's Health Collective Conference, National Poetry Therapist Conference, The Baltimore City Jail, The Association of Women in Psychology Conference, Common Ground on the Hill Music and Arts Festivals, Random House Book Festival, Columbia International Festival, Baltimore’s Artscape, and a wide variety of venues that are too numerous to mention.

She conducts workshops and residency programs for diverse audiences using a multi-disciplined approach for women’s groups, festivals, conferences and students at numerous venues including: Howard Community College, Maryland Institute College of Art, Howard University, The University of Baltimore, Osher Institute, Mary Baldwin College, Wor-Wic Community College, The Baltimore Ethical Society, Lucent Technology, Women in Science and Engineering, The Black Jewish Forum of Baltimore, Heal a Woman Heal a Nation Conference, Anne Arundel Artist Teacher’s Institute, Chesapeake Center for the Arts – Leadership Arundel Arts Workshops, Carver Center for the Arts, Brookland Park Middle School, Elon Vital, the Good Sheppard Center, and Hamilton Elementary School in Baltimore, Maryland.

She is a sought after adjudicator for regional poetry literary and spoken word competitions, including both the national and regional NAACP Act – So Competitions, Howard County Public Library middle, high school poetry competitions, Poetry Out Loud competitions, Battle of Da Skoolz College Poetry Slams, and the Baltimore City Wide Youth Poetry Finals. She has served on literary advisory panels for the Maryland State Arts Council, testified on the necessity of arts funding on behalf of the Howard County Arts Council, and acted as grant reviewer for Baltimore Promotions and the Arts Grants Programs. She is currently a member of the Board of Directors of the Little Patuxent Review, and previously served on the Boards of Jambalaya Magazine, and the Baltimore Writer’s Alliance where she is President Emeritus.