Colin Sell wrote my role in this three-hander musical with me in mind, so it’s a pity I wasn’t good in it. I was playing a shell-shocked soldier, recovering in hospital. My then agent, who had come along to see it, looked me straight in the eye, told me I was miscast, and said he couldn’t understand why I didn’t want to concentrate on composing. I was beginning not to understand that either.
The second act of Iron Harvest began with a seven minute solo, a wonderfully ambitious piece of writing by Colin. I could sing it, apart from a very difficult top A just before the end that I became more and more anxious about, which thus became more and more of a mountain to climb. Nonetheless, it was to be another eight years before I took the hint and packed in performing.
