An account of my first performances of my one-hour show about 90s Indie music and fire at two Fringe festivals and the reviews of these shows. Midlands Fringe blog will follow in the next week.
Run through of show 1st June with Morecambe Fringe Director
I will make any excuse to visit the wide bay of Morecambe so when Matt Panesh, Morecambe Fringe Director, invited me to perform my show in front of him ahead of the Fringe I knew this was too good an opportunity to pass up. Having never done anything like this before I valued his feedback, guidance and critique.
So, I ran through my show in Matt’s front room and he told me the bits he felt worked and why and then said ‘Writer Sarah has done a great job! Now let Performer Sarah take the words, inhabit them, memorise them, do them the justice they deserve, we know the words are good. Show me that!’
The next day we went to The West End Playhouse, Matt’s venue on Yorkshire Street West, which holds an audience of 35 when at capacity. We ran through the main 3-minute show poem for 2 hours and this was intense and instructive and it was a new experience to be stage-managed. Matt also advised me how to memorise my pieces. I have always just said ‘I can’t memorise!’ but with Matt’s pointers, support and belief I have located a super-power within me. We worked on some script analysis together at the Picture Frame looking across the bay – one of my favourite places and views.
I practiced poems from the show in front of my mirror and an audience every chance I got at Grand Plans and Attic Stories in Huddersfield, Marsden Library Poetry Open Mic, a guest spot at WOW! in Hull Library and on Baildon Moor at Poetry on the Moor.
Practicing my show poems plenty
The Bay Fringe – Morecambe
So, the 12th July came around fast and by then I had eight of the pieces memorised and felt happy I was doing more than reciting five of these, inhabiting the poems in a similar way to the poem Matt and I had worked on for hours.
Firstly, I arrived on the Friday and met Stuart Thomas just ahead of his show ‘Bad Fatty’, a work in progress, testing out quite a bit of material for his run at Edinburgh Fringe. Funny, engaging, honest.
Then, we had two after parties and gazed on a pretty stunning full moon between clouds. But earlier, in the evening, a classic Morecambe Bay sunset. This is one of the reasons my next collection is shaping up to be called Yet Another Morecambe Love Poem. I am only partly joking here… take a look at this to see why!
Show day 12th July!
Matt and I went out for pre-show breakfast, fuel for the show, and I ran through the poems/pieces in my head while Matt was in the breakfast queue. The day was very hot and the walk along the promenade was long, so I went via the Off Licence to get some cold cans of Fanta and Hobgoblin IPA.
I was thinking I may go elsewhere for the hour before my show but then I wanted to support Jonny Brook by watching his show which was before mine. His show was about disability and medical challenges. He was seated for a raw, witty and well-crafted show. Jonny was low-energy so I felt following this may be too much of a contrast, as I am pretty energetic and excitable about my theme.
Just before I was about to take to the stage another performer, Denzil, offered me his Bluetooth speaker for music clips in the show and one bit of speech from a musician. I had never used a Bluetooth speaker and didn’t realise it wouldn’t kick-start the walk-on music from the next room so I walked on and then my walk-on music started… the show went well. People were receptive, the stage lights were new to me and a little disconcerting and I lost my way in one poem but focused and found my way back without resorting to the book, the props worked well and I may add another couple.
Being a show among others by comedians, actors, teachers, dancers (many people used to holding attention indefinitely) I felt a little out of my depth as a poet who is pretty much just very excited about a very particular era of music between Madchester and Britpop. Many of the audience told me how much they enjoyed the show, I sold a few books and am happy I received a 4/5 review in the Lancaster Guardian.
First review of my show!
Reminiscing on the magic of 90s music, Dixon recites poems from her book, ‘A Bit Like Falling In Love’. The well considered and sometimes humorous staging and props along with her passionate anecdotes between poems make it clear that Dixon truly loves her craft. Dixon describes how proud ‘teenage Sarah’ would be of her performing alongside and meeting her heroes, and I think Dixon gave a performance ‘adult Sarah’ can be incredibly proud of too.
4/5 Dorian Ralston
The rest of Saturday
The rest of the evening at the West End Playhouse was expertly hosted by Sister Christian and Lorraine Hoodless work is progress mentioned peri-menopause and situations I could definitely empathise with and she shared comedic anecdotes about daily life. Zoe Lambert performed a polished, moving and many-voiced show which received a well-deserved 5/5 review. I had heard Zoe exploring some of the ideas in the show when she performed at my Quiet Compere poetry showcase back in 2022 and it was exciting and interesting to see how this had developed into a full-length show.
Final show of the evening was Denzil De Cristo. Denzil’s show incorporated bad singing, stories about AI and one-liners. I enjoyed the slight chaos of it and I know Denzil is at Edinburgh Fringe right now so go and say Hi! and catch his show if you get chance.
Beach Fire Finale
Back to Morecambe
I will be opening the Morecambe Poetry Festival with my show at 1630 on Friday 12th September and tickets are now available for the festival which in its fourth year and is always one of my highlights of the year, teeming with friends, full of hugs, words, connection, joy and community. See you there?
Thanks to Matt and the Bay Fringe Team for all their support, advertising and hosting of my first performance of my first one-hour show. I look forward to seeing a lot of you at the poetry festival.
Sarah L Dixon Writer 
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