During his 30-year career with The Times, Alan has been the editor of the paper’s PHS column, as well as writing his own regular feature, Alan Franks’s Diary. This became a book, published by J.M. Dent, and then a radio series for Woman’s Hour, which he read himself. His work has taken him all over the world, climbing a 23,000-feet peak in the Andes, learning how to duet with Tony Bennet at the Frank Sinatra Music School and writing for The Times Saturday Magazine on a wide variety of subjects. As an interviewer he has met and written about a large number of top practitioners in public life and the arts, particularly, music, literature and the theatre/cinema. These include, in music:  Paul McCartney, David Bowie, Paul Simon, Chuck Berry, Brian Wilson, Andrew Lloyd-Webber, Wynton Marsalis, Ravi Shankar, Philip Glass, Peter Maxwell-Davies; in literature: Anthony Powell, Barbara Cartland, Laurie Lee, James Baldwin, John le Carre; in the theatre/cinema: Judi Dench, Helen Mirren, Anthony Hopkins and Ian McKellen. Alan is married to Ruth Gledhill, creator of this site. He has four children. His son Simon Franks is a founder member of the Audio Bullys. Simon's brother Jimmy has recently joined the band as guitarist. 

You can watch a video of Alan and Patty performing his haunting beautiful song Arms of the Enemy at the Orange Tree. You can also watch Alan's sons Jimmy and Simon live at Glastonbury this summer and also in Bucharest a few days ago, performing their latest hit Gimme that Punk.