Last night, I read at SOLOFest in Coventry and thoroughly enjoyed it.

I read Twenty Miles South from my Night Swimming collection, and it went down very well. It was great to finally meet Andrew Fletcher, and Chris O’Connell. Andrew organised SOLOFest, and Chris put the open mic slots together. It was also a real pleasure to meet Sinead Brady and Jackie Armstrong two talented Coventry writer/performers.

However, the best part of the night for me was Toby Thompson’s I Wish I Was A Mountain.

Toby’s story was based upon Faldum, a Hermann Hesse fairy tale. Toby used turntables to play mellow jazz, cassette tapes for birdsong, an array of wooden houses that opened out to reveal candles and elephants, as well as a piano that he played refrains upon often along with the jazz records. These inventive props were great, but the real magic came from Toby’s delivery which was full of energy and wonder. The performance posed the question – What would you do if you were happy? How would you be if you had everything you wanted? I’m not sure how long the performance lasted, but I could’ve watched him all night.

I’ll certainly be looking out for future performances from Toby and you should too.