Alan Franks is an award-winning author, musician and journalist with many plays, records and poems to his name. In the past four years his poems have won several prizes, including the inaugural Wigtown Competition, Scotland’s largest, and the Petra Kenney Award, judged by poet laureate Andrew Motion. As well as writing poetry he composes and performs songs with the singer Patty Vetta. They have made hundreds of appearances at clubs, festivals and on radio, and the first of their four CDs, “Will” was named by Time Out as one of the top “Roots” albums of 1995. One of the songs, The Wishfulness Waltz, became the title track of a collection by the veteran folk-rock band, Fairport Convention. He also performs his poems regularly at jazz clubs, and is collaborating as a lyricist with the tenor saxophonist and composer, Tim Whitehead. His most recent plays are Previous Convictions, at Richmond’s Orange Tree Theatre, and The Edge of the Land, which made a three-month tour of eastern England. His others include The Mother Tongue at Greenwich Theatre, starring Prunella Scales, and Our Boys, with Beatty Edney. His latest play, Augusta, featuring Brazilian film star Antonia Frering, went on London in October, 2008. His prose fiction includes the novel Boychester’s Bugle, published by Heinemann and New English Library, and the novella “Going Over,” which won a competition run by the “New Writer” magazine. As a journalist, he has written for The Times for nearly thirty years. During that time he has written on a wide variety of subjects, and twice been nominated for a British Press Award.

To download his music, visit iTunes and search under 'Vetta and Franks'. Or to buy a CD of Alan and Patty's latest album, go to Patty and Alan's music website.

Sample Wishfulness Waltz

For more samples of Alan and Patty's music, see their albums under 'Music' at the top of this page.