Born in 1975, Fay is a classically trained singer from Cardiff who has been getting on stages since the early eighties. Ze was bitten by the performance poetry bug in 2006 in Milton Keynes, after a favour to a friend turned into a place in the final of a poetry slam, and now describes zirself as a “peripatetic, percussive, performance poet with a penchant for project management.”
Ze helped to run Poetry Kapow! in Milton Keynes from 2007 to 2011 and has been involved with the Cambridge chapter of Hammer & Tongue since 2010. Ze set up Cambridge arts label Allographic in 2011, a live events platform and small press. Ze has been the Artistic Director for Spoken Word at The Free Fringe in Edinburgh since 2013 (mostly collaboratively), and host of critically acclaimed Fringe show Other Voices Spoken Word Cabaret since 2012. In 2014, ze ‘won’ the Edinburgh Fringe Anti-Slam as Melody Starchild. In 2017, zir first solo show, The Selkie, was shortlisted as best spoken word show of 2016–17 for the Saboteur Awards. Ze was Glastonbury Festival Poetry&Words Stage’s official blogger in 2019. Ze has been delivering poetry workshops and courses since 2014, and in 2017 ze accidentally became a voice actor, which sometimes feels like a dream come true.
Ze still sings – persistently, and occasionally still bangs a drum with more than metaphorical fervour. Zir work has been described as ‘lyrical’, ‘engaging’, ‘scarily good’, and as ‘musical’, ‘mellifluous’, and ‘mesmerising’.
Fay has performed in pubs, clubs, theatres, tents, malls, ships, museums, art galleries, stone circles, squats, haunted houses, and stately gardens; in open mic, slams, showcases, features, support, English, Welsh, French, BSL, accompaniment, collaboration, competition, and costume across the UK (and worldwide, thanks to Zoom!).
Zir first full collection, Spectral, came out with Burning Eye in March 2022, and ze describes it as “a kind of poetry concept album, with illustrations…”
Other people have described it as “a beautiful, fiercely personal multimedia experience” (Leanne Moden); “a promise, and a standard, a flag in the ground, and beacon of hope.” (Rick Dove); and “a rich collection that challenges, satisfies and inspires with sheer elegance and a mastery over language akin to an entomologist focus over a new species of butterflies.” (Myriam San Marco)
(See more reviews for Spectral here.)
What People Say About Fay:
“We need more poetry like this... funny, confident, modest and a really bloody good poet to listen to.” Hollie McNish
“…Fay’s brave, quietly-defiant, joyous poems are some of the best of what the spoken word world has to offer and prise apart the binaries to release a world of gloriously sensuous, immersive wordery.” Kate Fox
“With the calm of a Summer pond and the voice of an ASMR specialist, Fay is a velvet cushion of a poet, threading words together with the weft and warp of a witch with a PhD in word crochet.” Scott Tyrrell
“Known to us as ‘The Welsh Whisperer’, Fay Roberts has the ability to bring a room to total silence, [zir] mellifluous tones sending her audience into a dream like trance… cannot recommend [zir] highly enough.” – Paul Eccentric, speaking part of The Antipoet
“... [zir] poetry combines lyrical flair with a solid emotional core. In a scene full of copycats and trend-chasers, there is no one quite like [zir]...” Tim Clare
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