Playwright Simon Stephens and Composer David Shrubsole join Martin and Sam to talk about the influence of Kurt Weill, the nature of musical theatre and the origins of the story at the heart of The Black Rider. Looking at Porgy and Bess and the performance of Nina Simone in terms of themes of addiction, we touch on other autobiographical elements of the play, as well as the effect of poetic vs dramatic lyric writing.

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Music extracts used for illustrative/review purposes include: Just The Right Bullets, The Black Rider, Tom Waits (1993) I Loves You Porgy, Little Girl Blue, Nina Simone (1958)

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