Songs and poems in a creative afternoon

TWO friends are teaming up for an afternoon of music and poetry at a Reading-based arts centre next month.

Songwriter Non Canon and poet Suzannah Evans will be visiting The Rising Sun, where there will be a selection of songs about feelings and politics, and verse on a range of themes including future anxiety, climate grief and human expansion into other galaxies.

Dubbed by the artists as “an evening of sad songs and poems delivered with good humour”, both artists grapple with some of the more melancholy aspects of life, touching on mental health, climate anxiety and political turmoil, but with an optimistic resolve and fun-filled approach to performance.

Non Canon, aka Bristol songwriter Barry Dolan, and Sheffield-based poet Suzannah have been friends since they met on their first day of university in 2001, and bonded over a shared love of Idlewild, Ben Folds Five and Less Than Jake.

After countless evenings spent chatting in the pub about the similarities and differences between poetry and independent music, Barry and Suzannah hatched a plan for a tour where the two art forms could overlap, with local poets and musicians completing each bill. n They will be visiting The Rising Sun on Saturday, April 22, with the show starting at 2pm. Tickets cost £7.70, and can be bought by logging on to: https://linktr.ee/dolanthology like to thank every individual, organisation, society, business and council who for half a century have helped us make a difference to the lives of so many in our community.

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The centre’s Gift For Gold campaign