Around 1996 I started teaching music composition part time at South Tyneside College. Here I met poet, playwright and local historian Tom Kelly. Tom had written many songs too and over the next 3 years or so we exchanged stories and anecdotes in the staff room. I told Tom of my early days in a rock band whilst serving an apprenticeship at Consett Steel Works and how I “escaped”.
Then one day passed me a note “Steel Town…a new musical..a young man dreams of escaping, to be a rock and roll star…”
Of course I was hooked and we embarked on what was to become quite and adventure for me.