Masses of music as autumn winds whirl...

Starting with music, superlatively good in Frome last week - and there were jazz session and Celtic sessions too...   The Cornerhouse had standing room only on Friday for a sensational blues session from Pete Gage Band, then on Saturday that venue transformed into a Bowey-inspired party night as Rebel Heroes gave a storming performance with atmospheric visual effects.

A walk down the road on sunny Sunday for Nunney Acoustic Cafe, where as well as great local artists we were treated to Swindon's fabulous folk band Splat the Rat and Danny McMahon from Bristol, currently topping the iTunes Country Chart.

When a musical duo takes the name Leonardo's bicycle you don't really know what to expect because it never existed. True, a bicycle sketch purportedly by the C15th Florentine artist inventor was allegedly found in Milan in 1974, but examination revealed that the paper had been folded & glued to hide a selection of penises not thought to be in the hand of the master, though whether that was due to poor craftsmanship or poor likeness hasn't been clarified. The new theory is that the bicycle was forged in the 1960s - (“It’s the sort of thing a bored monk might do,” says Nicholas Clayton, editor of The Boneshaker, the magazine of the British Veteran-Cycle Club) which brings me nicely to the Three Swans on Thursday, where the best of 1960s & '70s music was played live all evening by two amazing musicians who travel under the enigmatic banner of that non-existent vehicle.

Da Vinci musings bring us nicely into art, and the opening of a new show at the HUBnub of work by Susanna Lisle ;- paintings inspired by local landscape and Islamic tradition of geometric patterning, combining both elements in paintings big enough to look striking even in the massive proportions of the gallery in the old Whittox Lane Chapel.

Over now to Theatre Royal Bath, where Ruth Jones, famous for her role as louche, laconic Nessie on TV’s comedy series Gavin and Stacey, is the featured star in The Nightingales, a drama about a song group with aspirations of small-screen stardom. They seem a jolly, ordinary, bunch but nobody is quite what they first seem, and cracks in their cohesion are inevitable when wild-card Maggie persuades them to compete for Britain's Got Talent. William Gaminara's play is tightly interlaced with televisual references as the plot unrolls with several sections of narration direct to audience and bursts of song. The set, a village hall, is awesomely realistic (designer Jonathan Fensom) and this is a slick production which, as Miss Jean Brodie might say, will appeal to those who like that sort of thing.  My favourite character was Sarah Earnshaw's sassy Connie, spitting fury at Maggie's aspirations to be the next Susan Boyle. Now touring in London. Image: Geraint Lewis

So in the week when arguments about poppies replace arguments on fireworks, I'll leave you with an image of my local walk, and the good news that Nevertheless is returning:
Scratchings is our newly-formed combination with Frome Actors Network, with a production of four shorts already planned for the 2019 Festival... here's Becki, Lou and Mark somewhat shocked after our first read-through...

May Medley (2): historical dramas, art, life, and fish.

If you want an antidote to all those ponderous & inscrutable period plays, filmed or staged, look no further than Bath Spa University Theatre where the third year students have brought the 18th century comedy The Servant of Two Masters vividly up-to-any-date-you-think-of, and the audience couldn't stop laughing.  On a candy-striped set as sublimely silly as the plot and dressed in costumes either ludicrous or gaudy or both, a company of talented young actors showed huge professionalism in this high-energy romp in which three determined women successfully outwit three foolish & greedy men. Bravo to Beatrice, superbly played by Gabrielle Finnegan, and her lucky Florindo ~ and how lucky also that two of the shiniest stars of the show are coming to Frome for Nevertheless Fringe Theatre festival production: Time Slides.

From matches to hatches and dispatches, without the blissed-out bit in the middle: Vamos Theatre brought their new show The Best Thing to Frome's Merlin theatre. This production, writer-director Rachael Savage explains in the programme, is a tribute and apology to the women of the late 1960s who gave up their children for adoption under pressure to do ‘the best thing’.  Her two-year research is synthesised into the tale of one such girl recalled after her death when her father and daughter finally meet, bringing reconciliation to both. I found these programme notes essential, as a two-generation difference is difficult for young actors to convey without speech or change of facial expression, and the projected black-&-white visuals seemed mismatched to era ~ I say this with some assurance as my first baby was born in 1968.  Vamos is famous and highly-regarded for its wordless masked performances and the four actors are immensely skilful at body-language but it still takes a lot of mindwork to join the dots.

It's a serious topic but the show isn't all sombre: there are laugh-aloud comedic scenes like the shadow-silhouette coitus to that 1966 World Cup commentary "They think it's all over ~  it is now!”, the typing lesson, and even the labour ward. But as a coulrophobic I find it difficult to relate to masked characters however clever their gestures, and the soundtrack ~ after an initial burst of Lulu’s 1964 hit Shout ~ relentlessly avoids evoking any era. Sound is important in a wordless story and I did wonder if with different music the school party at the back might have stopped texting & chatting as the drama onstage slowly unfolded. But it was great to see the theatre so full, and the four actors behind 17 different masks were loudly applauded.

Animating Images is the exciting new exhibition at Black Swan Arts, curated by David Daniels. David's own work is on display alongside several other renowned animation artists and there are films, examples of storyboards & character sheets, and explanations of terms & processes, with a talk on May 19th.

Away-day corner: I'm less involved with courses now, my writing interests having taken me other ways, but this week have actually led two sessions: one for the Edventure 'Earning a Living in the Creative Arts'  course at 42 Acres ~ great to work with a group of young people choosing to design their own futures rather than fit into the square holes of routine 'job-specifications'. At the end of the session I asked for a 60-second summary in different style from everyone ~ here's my 'recipe': Ingredients: several acres of sunlit ground  ~  an old house cunningly converted ~ a dozen shiny people, curious, humorous and articulate.  Method: Place the house on the grass.  Sprinkle in the shiny people. Listen to them. They are all wonderful.

And on Saturday I went to Cheltenham for a reunion session with a group that first met several years ago in the Isle of Wight on a Skyros Holistic Holiday weekend, and has, impressively, continued to meet regularly ever since in various venues. They're great company and excellent writers, and such is their enthusiasm that we wrote, read, and discussed, for over four hours at the Abbey Hotel. Cheltenham railway station is about a mile from the centre via a footpath route strewn with wildflowers and May blossom ~ a delightful end to an immensely enjoyable session.

Back in Frome, Archangel's Sunday musician was Tom Corneill, playing in the courtyard as the sun shone and various small people danced.  This week's footnote post is a sad one though.
A leakage of slurry upstream has poisoned this stretch of the Frome, killing over 500 fish and countless invertebrates: an anxious prognosis for the health of the river stock this season and for the kingfishers and otters too. Good news is that the Environment Agency stepped in swiftly and the water quality is being restored so hopefully the river will recover.

Imbolc... a boondoggle of a holiday

Imbolc is the pagan term for these very early days of spring, and its goddess Brigid is associated with poetry, fire, and fertility: she's also been adopted by the catholic church, which may be why I found when I googled Imbolc I found that  for many reasons, Imbolc is a boondoggle of a holiday.  I took that to mean a bit of a mishmash, like the last meal at the end of a camping trip, but further googling yielded: boondoggle: an unnecessary, wasteful, or fraudulent project.  Which really doesn't seem appropriate for last week in Frome.

Saturday saw a few hundred people making their way to the Silk Mill for 'One day to make a difference' ~ for the refugees in Calais ~ to donate warm clothes and cash, shop at the stalls, bring and buy cakes, and listen to the stonking songs of the Wochynskis. At the end of the event, the 'Bruton, Frome & Glastonbury group of Aid & Solidarity with Refugees' reported that the total raised topped £1366, and the cash and clothes are now already on their way out to Calais and to Syria.

Another great week for music in Frome ~  maybe we should change our motto from the vaguely aspirational 'It's a wonderful place' to 'The town where free gigs abound'?  After Bonne Nouvelle rocking the Archangel on Sunday afternoon, we had Ben Cipolla at the always-excellent Roots Grain Bar session on Wednesday.


Moving to things literary: Frome Writers Collective monthly meeting on Monday featured a book quiz from demon question-setter Brenda Bannister, here on the right looking innocent as the winner beams and rest of us hide our sheets of shame. All good fun, though. And novelist Debbie Holt, who is a proxy Frome writer because she's been in one of our (smaller) writing group for twelve years, has a new book out on Thursday. The Soulmate is published by Accent Press and Debbie will be talking about it in Hunting Raven Books on February 22.

The amazing Mark Bruce Company premiered their epic (literally) new production at Frome's Merlin Theatre: The Odyssey is a dance-drama retelling of that legendary ten-year journey by the Greek hero Odysseu after ten years of war returning home to his loyal wife Penelope.

The details of Homer's story are all there ~ Medusa's snakes, Circe's swine, the lotus eaters, the unravelled weaving that keeps Penelope's suitors at bay, and much more ~ but Mark as choreographer & director is interested more in 'what it means to us individually.' Myths, he says 'hold a mirror to us all at different times in our lives.'  With barely a word throughout (none from the cast but a few from Frank Sinatra) this is terrific story-telling, Odysseus on his 'hero's journey' sometimes a timeless icon of masculinity and sometimes, as he lit another cigarette or embarked on another romance, more like James Bond. The dancing is stunningly good: I loved all the characters, especially the cheeky Immortal Man and twerking Circe, and the way the team enacted every role from the sacrificial lamb to the ship's figurehead. And no-one can have left without exclaiming over the set (is it a boat? a wooden horse? a portal to Hades?) the lighting, the costumes, and the music. Absorbing, entrancing, and exhilarating, all of it. Mark Bruce is a long-time Associate Artist of the Merlin Theatre, which makes me extremely chuffed to be one too. 

There's very little I can reveal about the comedy-thriller Death Trap at Salisbury Playhouse because it's got more twists than a corkscrew so almost any comment would be a spoiler. Suffice to say that if you know the theatrical theory of Chekhov's gun ~ that if a weapon is shown in the opening act, it must be used before the end of the play ~ then you'll be quivering at the armoury on the walls of blocked playwright Sidney Bruhl, and you'll be right to tremble. Ira Levin, who was also responsible for sinister films like Rosemary's Baby and The Stepford Wives, wrote this as a stage play in 1978: the current Salisbury Playhouse production is sharp, stylish, superbly set & lit, and brilliantly acted ~ especially by the thriller writers (Kim Wall and Sam Phillips) and their uncannily psychic neighbour Beverley Klein. On till 27th February, much more fun than murder on the telly.

That's it for this week. Rosie and I are off to Lyme Regis now, for a writerly weekend planning our next Nevertheless production so - watch this space! Well you do, anyway, don't you...?

Festival weekend: Sizzling Saturday & Stormy Sunday

The best thing about festival is the sheer number of amazing events, and the worst is that most inevitably clash, so my best aim can only be to give a taste. Frome Open Studios offer an amazing diversity as artists combine at each venue, with pens, pots, and photographs alongside paintings like Kate Cochrane's landscapes, and coastlines by Amanda Bee neighbouring Feverleaf's 'festivalesque finery and pixy clothing' at Silk Mill studios.

Saturday's sunshine held all day and into a balmy late night at Silk Mill cantina.  Frome Street Bandits led the parade through town to the Market Yard for the ever-popular food feast in early evening, followed by on-stage sessions from the Frome Jazz Club and Three Corners. Sunday's flash storm at the end of the Independent 'Wonderland' Market didn't daunt the wandering minstrels under the awning outside Lungi Baba or Jazz in the Afternoon at the Victoria Park bandstand.  More jazz at The Cornerhouse evening jam session, after a stonking session from the amazing Captain Cactus: "Rootin'-tootin'.... sort of like hula-swamp with bits of bluegrass and acoustic country rock avec les Screaming Harlots wailing like African Queens." (That's another Griff quote, I suspect)

And there are lots of excellent word-y things, or 'Literary Events' as the brochure highlights call them. Frome Writers Collective revived the 'Writers in Residence' event, with ten writers settled in cafes pubs & shops around town, scribing throughout Saturday on a set theme. Paul Newman was at Hunting Raven talking about his book Netted in a Silver Mist, which combines his drawings from the natural environment with words from Jill Harris to bring a deeper narrative to these superb evocations of wood, water, and stone.

With similar ekphrastic intention, our Words at the Black Swan workshop, led by David Davies, explored the Home In Frome exhibition to find personal recollections evoked by Mell Day's exquisite Postcards from an Ordinary Childhood and the amazing quilt of memories. Mell calls these glimpses of a past ~ all probably enhanced, possibly misremembered ~ "clear bright little moments... where our personality becomes our version of history, not snapshots but embodiments."

Sad to miss Al O'Kane's Magical Folk Garden acoustic music evening at the Archangel, my clash this time a rehearsal for Midsummer Dusk, our Nevertheless site-specific outdoor production for this festival. Director Rosie has made the Dissenters Cemetery look fantastic and our 'Star Players' are looking & sounding terrific... only 3 sleeps now till our opening night... 

Looking forward, looking back, and looking down...

This week several projects which were bubbling along nicely have started coming to the boil, which means I've now got various fabulous flyers and posters to distribute. Muffin Man is returning to the Cornerhouse for two nights in June with a sequel devised with impro from the cast: talented twosome Ross Scott and Fleur Hanby-Holmes. The show comprises a reprise of the original short play ~ which gave me the title Bard of Frome 2014 in the Frome Festival comedy play contest, a title I hand on in July to the next winning contestant ~  and an original song and stand-up comedy routine as well as the new play The Morning After.   
Looking ahead to the festival, as we do now the box office is open and tickets selling fast, our guest at the Poetry Café, hotfoot from Hackney's Hammer & Tongue, is 'Angry Sam' Berkson and a special open-mic on that Monday night will include selection of 'Festival Poet Laureate'. That's at the Garden Cafe and we're hoping, if it's a fine night, to be actually in the garden.

Midsummer Dusk is the festival offering from Nevertheless Productions ~ our first site-specific event, directed by Rosie Finnegan with my script and our newly-formed acting company. First read through last week confirmed this quintet of 'Star Players' are well-named: this promises to be a fantastic show and, since it's only on for two nights (Thursday & Friday) we expect to sell out early.

Black Swan is showing paintings by Dan Hampson inspired by the notion of exploration, and it's the most exciting exhibition I've seen for ages. Dan was at the launch and spoke tentatively and intriguingly about these cultural icons ~ Stanley, Livingstone, Captain Cook etc ~ as 'trying to be heroic but things are spiralling out of control because they're incomprehensible.' I can't wait to explore further myself at the Words at the Black Swan writers' workshop on Sunday 7th.

Reverberations of the Independents for Frome recent election success continue with a feature article in The Guardian on 'How Flatpack Democracy beat the old parties in the People's Republic of Frome', with a great picture of our joyful mob rulers and the story of their amazing triumph. And the week ended exuberantly with Frome Street Bandits and Orkestra del Sol in a dance-fest extraordinaire at the Cheese&Grain.

One of the quirks of writing a blog about what's on in and around Frome is the diversity sometimes leads to strange juxtapositions. Here's one of them: We Are Many directed by Amir Amirani ~ on general release from May 22nd  ~ had a special showing at 90 cinemas on Thursday, one of which was the Little Theatre in Bath. I had been one of the thousands who lost hope after that 2003 massive global protest when the largest mobilisation in the history of the world met with derisive dismissal from that reptilian pair of conspirators Bush & Blair. I went with Jill Miller on the march, and we went together a year later to see David Hare's play Stuff Happens expose the lies that were seeping out by now ~ the fait accompli timing, the dodgy dossier, the tricking of Blix. So now we all know this was an illegal war that needlessly killed millions and cost trillions, why does Jon Snow (who led the live Q&A) hail this movie as as 'a huge achievement which has exceeded all expectations"?
I've already seen querulous comments on facebook about the protest being worthless, but I still find it heartening to hear people like Tony Benn, Nelson Mandela, Ken Loach and Mark Rylance speaking so powerfully, and to see the Women for Peace calling out the war criminals and the Iraq veterans hurling their medals, and to know unequivocally that history shows 'the "deranged lefties" were absolutely right and the governments were wrong.'
But this movie offers more hope than Auden's lament Time will say nothing but I told you so.  There's been a seismic shift since the day 35 million people in 789 cities in 72 countries across the world said together 'Not In My Name.'  When Cameron in 2013 tried the same old rhetoric, his call to war was, for the first time ever in an English parliament, defeated. And in Egypt the seeds of the democracy movement that became know as the Arab Spring were sown.

A lighter end to this posting: I've yearned to go up in a balloon since watching Ashton Court fiesta, and my sons gave me a trip which for reasons mainly climatic was delayed until today. So at 7a.m. here I am floating over the fields beyond Bath on a champagne flight with Bristol Balloons.  A stunningly beautiful tapestry of sunny fields and dramatic shadows scrolls below a sky of searing blue as the Royal Crescent dwindles and for a delicious hour we watch field patterns unfold, deer running & cows meandering, ending after 14 miles at 2000 feet in a field in Nunney.  What can I say but Recommended.

The FWC blog hop edition!

Frome Writers Collective is one of those collaborative initiatives Frome seems to do so well, with regular meetings at Three Swans and a lively core group organising trips and other events for the writers, illustrators, editors, and publishers who have all joined. I'm privileged to be an honorary member, and very happy to support their Blog Hop (thanks Piotr for nominating me). So this posting will use as focus the five interview questions:

1. My genre? I've published both short stories and novels in the past, but now I'm focusing particularly on stage drama, with two long plays and several shorts produced. Currently my work-in-progress is for a Nevertheless Productions Frome Festival 2015 performance  ~  in the Dissenters Cemetery! Here's Rosie Finnegan, company founder & director of this piece, at our last production meeting.  Midsummer Dusk will be performed at twilight by three superb actors, and we think it will be fabulous.

I'm also connected with the poetry scene as organiser of the bi-monthly Poetry Cafe at the Garden Cafe in Stony Street ~ I've had some poems published (2 in Mslexia) and still perform randomly after a brief career as a performance poet (with a few slam wins) but have taken a step back to an organisational role now, as Frome positively brims with brilliant poets like Helen Moore, Rose Flint, Rosie Jackson, and more.
And I run the monthly Words at the Black Swan workshop, an open group meeting on the first Sunday of each month 3-4.30 in the gallery to respond to the current art exhibition. Next one April 5th, responding to the Young Open, which has some stunning images.
And linking poetry with drama, brilliant stand-up poet Rob Gee agreed to bring his award-winning one-man show FRUITCAKE to Frome's Merlin on March 27th. Not to be missed!
So in short, my writing life is a mix of doing it and working with other people who're doing it. Perfect.

2  Current projects?  As well as the play for Nevertheless Productions, I'm co-scripting a piece which will be performed by Annabelle Macfadyen, initially in the garden of the American Museum in Bath and later in Frome. Time Walk is basically the story of the whole of life in the last 4.6 billion years... massive research required but all fascinating. We performed a version in the festival last year and are now busily updating with recent cosmic research.
I also review for Plays International, which involves enjoying great productions at Theatre Royal Bath, Bristol Old Vic, Tobacco Factory, Salisbury Playhouse ~ and of course at our own Merlin Theatre. My first responses are posted in my blog, then the best are combined for my column. And I count this blog itself as a writing project too ~ my aim is to show all the amazing creative stuff that goes on in Frome!
3 Jack London once said "You can't wait for inspiration, you have to go after it with a club." Which may be true, as long as you don't stun it senseless, but in my experience of working with writers on creative courses for nearly 20 years, the problem is more likely to be self-doubt than lack of enthusiasm. Most writers have a severe self-critic, ready to whisper negatively whether they do write ('that's terrible prose!) or don't ("see, you've run out of ideas already!")  Negotiating with that inner voice is key: persuade it to let you originate freely, and then invite it back later to edit. Fay Weldon explains more in her essay Harnessed to the Harpy in the Penguin collection The Agony and the Ego (recommended for fiction writers, orderable from Hunting Raven Books)

4 When bored with staring at a blank page...  actually I can't help there, as writing to me has since childhood been as enticing as Black Magic to a chocoholic. I'd suggest going for a walk ~ but take a notebook. And of course, a creative writing course (like the ones on Skyros or in Andalucia) never fails to inspire...
5  My personal favourite place to work is anywhere I can take my laptop ~ cafes in Frome like the River House, Divas, the Garden Cafe. At home I've got a study which has sunset views. And I always, always, always carry a notebook.

So, on to the next FWC member to share their modus operandi.  Do take a look at the web page of Alison Clink, founder of the Frome Festival short story contest, prolific & much published short story writer, and now memoirist, whose book The Man Who Didn't Go To Newcastle is about to be launched. This immensely moving tribute to her brother combines pathos with humour and gives insight, as her publisher promises, "into what happens when ordinary lives are faced with the extraordinary."

Footnote to this somewhat patchwork posting: Bristol theatre company Show of Strength teamed up with Wells Festival of Literature on Saturday to offer twelve short plays in 15 shops throughout the day in their 'Trading Local' free theatre event.  FWC member Tim O'Connor was one of the writers, with a very funny monologue located in a flower shop.  I didn't get to see all the plays as I'd spent the morning at Frome's Welshmill Pump Track marvelling at the skill & speed of the bikers (youngest just 5 years old! and the older lads went round like rockets) but the plays I saw were all excellent. Here's David Reakes as Prince Steve, looking for a dance outfit in the sale rail... gentle humour with a powerful & moving subtext. And ~ because it's all theatre too ~ here's a glimpse of the bikers


and some of last week's musical gems: Back Before Breakfast at the Grain bar, and the community choir at Wesley Chapel. Frome really does have it all!