Ledbury

Just back from Ledbury Poetry Festival. I was there for the second weekend, reading on Saturday with Mick Wood, managing to grab a few other events en route. The first was Meirion Jordan, reading with Ruth Bidgood - quite a contrast of voices. He's good, this is a very accomplished first collection. Sarah Crown called it "a startling, lubricious debut". He reads well, too.

That night, I heard Aoife Mannix at last, accompanied by Janie Armour with great wit and intelligence. Very accomplished, thoughtful and all with such a light, sassy touch. Deserved a much bigger audience.

As for my reading with Mick Wood on the Saturday morning, it was a blast. A lovely, responsive audience. And Mick was wonderful, a real star. A seasoned thesp, he had the audience in his hand. His poems have a keen dramatic intelligence, and the audience respond to that. His delivery values the reading as a dramatic encounter, not just voiced words on a page. Couldn't be much further from the grey armchair school of poetry reading - one I've never subscribed to anyway. When poets profess to eschew a dramatic reading and "let the words speak for themselves" they are too often copping out. A performance that prefers one interpretation over another doesn't preclude those other interpretations for all time; it's questionable whether it erases the possibility of other readings even during the performance itself. The performer's first duty is to the audience, and the Ledbury audience hugely appreciated that.

An honour to be reading with him.

I took the rest of the afternoon off, going with friends up the Malverns, to sit in sunshine and the western wind surveying Herefordshire, Worcestershire, Gloucestershire and Wales, while eating strawberries and consuming lashings of ginger beer, while far below we could hear strains of tuning up for the Jools Holland concert. (Thanks, Gary!)

Rather than Jools Holland, I chose to hear Martin Figura debut Whistle, the show he is taking to Edinburgh. Based on the collection published earlier this year by Arrowhead, the poems, delivered with Mart's inimitable confidence, nous and warmth, layered and textured with slide show and recordings, earned a standing ovation. You don't get that so often at poetry readings. The story the poems tell is heartbreaking, but Mart tackles it with courage and humour. It was an intimate, generous experience. As a fellow Sixer, I've known Mart for quite a while, and enormously value his emotional intelligence vis à vis audience.

As I said, the performer's first duty is to the audience. He's a fabulous reader. I wish him every success in Edinburgh, and if Ledbury is anything to go by they will be crowding it out before he's through.

As for Ledbury, I was torn between going to lots of events and preserving my sanity. There is just too much to do.

The last event I managed to get to was Roz Goddard and Penny Shuttle (standing in for Dan Chiasson, who was indiposed). Roz's Soprano sonnets were witty and astute, and I know I missed a lot from being a TV-phobe. She's a good reader, with a lovely rapport with the audience. As for Penny Shuttle, I have heard her read loads of times, but don't tire, even of poems like "Filth", which I've heard so often I probably know by heart.