I’ve just returned from a gloriously sweltering Edinburgh where Mark Kermode and I hosted our first official event promoting our film music book Mark Kermode’s Surround Sound: The Stories of Movie Music. It was sold out and I was so impressed and appreciative that people came along to sit in a tent on one of the hottest days of the year!
It took place on Tuesday 12th August and earlier in the day, Mark and I went to Topping and The Portobello Bookshop to sign copies for their customers. It was my first time at The Portobello Bookshop and it’s gorgeous! What a treat for the people of Porty (and beyond). Highly recommended – as is Toppings which I believe is expanding to York and Glasgow in the near future.
Shortly after arriving at the Edinburgh International Book Festival site, we appeared on The Arts Mix for BBC Radio Scotland. They’d set up camp in the drinks tent (and why not?!) so they could record some episodes capturing the atmosphere of the festival. The host Len Pennie is brilliant and she was very positive about the book, which is always nice to hear! The other guest was crime writer extraordinaire Val McDermid who was on to talk about her play And Midnight Never Come which is all about the life – or rather, the death – of Christopher Marlowe.
Have a listen here (available for 30 days): Afternoons – The Arts Mix – From the Edinburgh International Book Festival: author Val McDermid and film critic Mark Kermode – BBC Sounds
After a brief bit of downtime to plan what we were going to discuss at our event, then we found ourselves onstage at the Courtyard Theatre. It’s all a bit of a blur to me now, but I think we described what the book’s about, explained how the collaboration happened following our work together on the Scala Radio film music show, and shared our highlights from our interviews with film composers. Mark read an excerpt from the introduction, which provides some background to his journey into the world of film soundtracks, and we answered audience questions at the end, ranging from our thoughts on how AI will affect scoring to whether we’ve ever disagreed on a film score (answer: yes) and whether we’ll do a radio show together again (answer: watch this space).
The event was followed by a book signing where we met some lovely friendly folk, including some very loyal Kermode & Mayo vanguardistas! It was quite the privilege to witness the encounters and find out how much Mark and Simon’s film review show/podcast means to people.
If you were there, thanks so much for making our first official Surround Sound event so much fun, and thanks also to the Book Festival team who were brilliant!
We’ll be in the following places in September:
Monday 8th – BFI Southbank, London
Tuesday 9th – French Protestant Church of London, Soho Square (in association with Waterstones Piccadilly)
Wednesday 10th – Komedia, Bath (in association with Mr B’s Emporium of Reading Delights)
Thursday 11th – Savoy Theatre, Monmouth (in association with Rossiter Books)
Friday 12th – Midlands Arts Centre, Birmingham (in association with Film Stories)
Thursday 18th – The Cheap Street Church, Sherborne (in association with Winstone’s Books)
Friday 19th – Budleigh Salterton Literary Festival
Plus some more still to be announced!
