Ledbury's Market Theatre line-up (From Malvern Gazette)

Ledbury's Market Theatre line-up

2:04pm Monday 23rd March 2009

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A TRUE story about Shakespeare’s daughter and a production charting the life of Bob Dylan are just two of the plays to look forward at the Market Theatre in Ledbury in the coming months From April 22-25 the Ledbury Amateur Dramatic Society (LADS) will be performing The Herbal Bed, a play by Peter Whelan, written specifically for the Royal Shakespeare Company.

The play is set in the year 1613 and is a retelling of a scandal involving Shakespeare’s eldest daughter, Susanna Hall.

Susanna is married to respected local physician John Hall who uses his fees from the rich to treat the poor.

Together, they maintain a herbal garden blessed with a crop that seems to have miraculous healing qualities. One night, Rafe Smith, their handsome married neighbour, is observed secretly leaving the garden, and Jack Lane, John’s scheming student, accuses Susanna of adultery.

Susanna sues Jack in the ecclesiastical courts at Worcester Cathedral to protect her name and save her husband’s practice. But the allegations threaten to destroy everything the Halls have created, at a time in history where a woman’s reputation was as fragile as the health of John’s patients.

This passionate human drama, inspired by the few documented facts available, was first performed to critical acclaim at the RSC’s The Other Place in Stratford-upon-Avon (a theatrical space designed by the same architect as Ledbury’s Market Theatre).

On Saturday May 2 the theatre welcomes Beck Siàn and Whalebone. This promises to be an evening of beautiful acoustic music featuring two of the brightest talents on the music scene.

Beck Siàn draws on inspiration from her native Australia to create what she describes as 'haunted forest music’. Sometimes reminiscent of Kate Bush, who is a relative, Beck performs enchanting songs with voice, guitar, whistle and didgeridoo. Whalebone is a rootsy, folky, funky acoustic trio who perform their own compositions alongside supercharged renditions of traditional music and re-workings of rock guitar classics, all played with dazzling musicianship. Tickets cost £9.

On Saturday May 9 is Bob Dylan & The Poetry Of The Blues (£10). Michael Gray, the author of The Bob Dylan Encyclopaedia and Song & Dance Man III - definitive studies of Dylan’s work - uses a surprising selection of great records and rare footage to show how hugely Dylan has been inspired by the blues Michael Gray’s events are lively, spontaneous, witty and acute, offering a thoroughly entertaining, fresh account of Dylan’s achievement.

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