Can You Dig It?

Plough Arts Centre, Torrington

Thursday, February 9, 8pm

IF you hate slugs then you'll love this – a musical comedy show all about the ups and downs of growing your own. Sprouting from the fertile brains of comedy songwriters and real-life allotment gardeners Jo Stephenson and Dan Woods, Can You Dig It? features a wheelbarrow-load of songs covering topics including compost, annoying allotment neighbours and digging.

"Dan and I first met at a musical comedy night then later discovered we both had allotments and thought it would be great to do a show about our feeble attempts to grow vegetables and some of the characters we have met along the way," said Jo. "Quite a lot of stuff in the show is about things that have happened on our allotments. For example, we do a song about the theft of a giant marrow – that happened to someone on my plot. Other songs are inspired by the wider world of gardening, like our love song to Alan Titchmarsh. He's an unlikely sex symbol but the ladies love him."

Highlights of the show, which earned rave reviews at the 2011 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, include a rap battle between an angry gardener and a slug, a 1980s-style power ballad to cuddly gardening guru Alan Titchmarsh and a virtuoso performance on the cucumber trumpet.

"The aim is to make people laugh and hopefully people will go away humming some of the songs," said Jo. "We have one about the compost brand John Innes that really seems to get stuck in people's heads. We make and play musical instruments made out of vegetables so hopefully we also inspire people to look at their crops or dinner in a whole new way."

Can You Dig It? is aimed at both vegetable-growing novices, seasoned cultivators and people who don't even own a plot.

"The show will definitely appeal to anyone who has ever tried to grow their own or has an interest in gardening," added Jo. "However, there's plenty there for non-gardeners so it's really for anyone who likes music and comedy. The show features a wide range of musical styles including pop, rap and folk. Our audiences range in age from about eight to 80."

Tickets: £13 (full), £12 (concession), £11 (Plough supporter). Box office: 01805 624624.