Alley Theatre to host conversation event with best-selling author

RENOWNED music historian, author, columnist and media commentator Elizabeth Sharkey will discuss her latest publication at a special conversation event at the Alley Theatre in Strabane next month.

The wife of former Undertones frontman and renowned solo artist Feargal Sharkey, Elizabeth will be discussing her best selling book ‘Why Britain Rocked: How Rock Became Roll and Took Over the World’

She will be joined in conversation with Beatles’ author Dr Richard Mills and live music will be performed by Chyan Davidson.

In the best-selling book Elizabeth travels deep into history to trace the events that led to its twentieth century musical explosion and argues that The Beatles’ arrival that so surprised the world really shouldn’t have been a surprise at all.

From the Celts and the Quakers, to Ira Aldridge and Paul Robeson, ‘Why Britain Rocked’ breaks out of British pop history’s twentieth century confines.

Instead, Sharkey starts the story in Celtic Britain and follows the migration of the peoples who carried their music from the British Isles to the southern states, laying the foundations of America’s folk music and ultimately, rock n’ roll.

She then brings the story back to the British Isles, identifying the Celtic inheritance of superstars from Lonnie Donegan and The Beatles, to David Bowie, John Lydon, Kate Bush, Johnny Marr, Noel Gallagher and Ed Sheeran and makes the bold claim that without Irish musicality, there would be no British pop.

Tickets are priced at £10 and are available from the Alley Theatre website www.alley-theatre.com or call the box office on 028 71 384444