Lights, music, action - for one last week...

A balmy evening and Merlin's ECOS amphitheatre last Saturday combined to create the perfect setting for great entertainment from the Unravelling Wilburys,  Frome's riposte to the supergroup septet (Bob Dylan, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison and Tom Petty, in case any of the names slip your mind as they did mine...) These Wilbury boys are the real thing, spotted and copied by the assorted musicians who nicked their name, so in response the Unravelling clan have nicked some of their songs - that was the story we heard, anyway, along with fantastic renditions of the songs of those rich eras.. Only the Lonely, Mr Tambourine Man, and While My Guitar Gently Weeps were my personal favourites but the entire show was brilliant, with humour as well as passionate nostalgia: "Don't make fun of the young people", ersatz Roy chides his mainly post-mature audience, "You probably take more drugs than they do."

With our local gigs now once again taken off the menu, words became the main theme for me last week, with the good weather allowing individual & small group outdoor writers' meetings, four in all, and two - yes TWO, poetry performances.  Merlin's ECOS proved excellent for our long-delayed Poetry Cafe event, easily big enough for social distancing all around the amphitheatre: here's Kieron Bacon at the mic early on - with fourteen poets and 9 o'clock finish, all the lights were needed by the end of a wonderful evening with a rich variety of subjects and styles. One of the highlights, in an event glimmering with them throughout, was Liv Torc's premier performance of her latest poem, There's Something About Mary, enriching and moving in equal parts - you can read it here.

More live performance to end the week, with a 'Pop-Up Poetry Party' at the Silk Mill, hosted by Jo Harrington for 42 Acres, who joined in on the open mic. Among my other favourites were Rosie Jackson's poem about reconnecting with the natural world, B's moving words to her imagined daughter, Cathy's sizzling riposte to an insult, Mike's bicycle-related histories, Owen's mum's poem about the granite hills of Talyllynn, and the unexpected guest spot from pro-performer Dave Hubble whose witty musings on humanity included evidence that humans offer less to the world than a sea anemone. Here's Jo, and the picture she took of me. Thanks Steve for providing sound for both these gigs. 

And if you've ever wondered what an Indonesian birthday breakfast party looks like, this wonderful spread will give you a clue: the eggs are a birthday speciality spiced with chilli, ginger, and garlic, and the vegetable centerpiece Gado Gabo was suffused with the flavour of coconut. The leaves are calaloo, in a light tempura. All delicious!

So there won't be much more from me about Frome's creative life for a while, and a community arts blog has no place for comments about hedge-fund racketeers raking in billions from their bets on a collapsing deal with EU while our portly buffoon of a PM fantasises about being leader of the gang, but I do recommend you read, or re-read, Orwell's Animal Farm. It's full of plangent relevance.

Ending this post with a personal pleasure that the new edict can't ban: yoga with YogaBen. As well as longer online sessions, this excellent tutor & practitioner generously offers free support in shorter youtube videos: check him out here, and subscribe or just try them out.