News / 31 Oct 2024
Television personality, chef and musician Andi Oliver to be awarded Honorary Masters Degree
University News
Award-winning TV chef and broadcaster Andi Oliver will receive an Honorary Master of Arts Degree from Leeds Arts University during a graduation ceremony held at The Royal Armouries, Leeds, on Monday 4 November 2024.
The ceremony will celebrate graduating students from across the University’s postgraduate and undergraduate degree courses.
With food and music always at the forefront, Andi Oliver enjoys a rich and varied career. She regularly appears on well-known food programmes both as host and contributing chef, but also contributes widely in the arts hosting Jazz 624 for BBC Four in 2019, a production which won best Music Programme at the Broadcast awards, and as host of The Cheltenham Literature Festival for Sky Arts alongside her daughter Miquita Oliver. Andi is a regular panel member on BBC Radio 4's The Kitchen Cabinet alongside Jay Rayner as well as a contributor to Radio 4’s Award winning programme, The Food Programme.
Andi rose to fame fronting the band Rip Rig and Panic with Neneh Cherry, and later went onto work in TV, debuting on Backstage at The Brits. She presented hit cult show Baadasss TV with musician Ice T and the award-winning documentary Crazy Sexy Cool. For six years Andi covered Glastonbury for the BBC as well as fronting various other BBC festivals.
Her long-awaited cookbook and memoir The Pepperpot Diaries: Stories From My Caribbean Table launched in 2023, featuring both traditional and new recipes, cherished ingredients and vibrant flavours from across the Caribbean. In 2024, for her new BBC Two show Andi Oliver's Fabulous Feasts, Andi joined a variety of fabulous communities across the UK and celebrated food with heart and soul.
“I am so completely thrilled to be receiving such an extraordinary accolade. I am so grateful and happy to do the work that I do and so this feels like the icing on the top of an already delicious cake!”
Andi Oliver, TV chef, musician and broadcaster
“We are delighted to present this year’s Honorary Master of Arts Degree to Andi Oliver. With a career spanning everything from food to music, broadcast and writing she is an inspirational example of just how varied a creative career can be. I hope our graduating students are encouraged by her success as they take their next steps into the creative industries”
Professor Simone Wonnacott, Vice-Chancellor, Leeds Arts University