On May 27th, at 7pm, the Hay on Wye Literature Festival David Gilmour and Polly Samson discuss their songwriting partnership, the writing process between lyricist and musician. They have collaborated on four No. 1 albums: Pink Floyd's The Division Bell and The Endless River, David Gilmour's On An Island, and the recent Rattle That Lock.

Tickets - priced at just £15.00, are on sale now from the festival website. Our thanks in particular to Adrian Childs-Clarke and Byron Lewis for letting us know about this.

Before this event though, Polly is joining Jonathan Lee and "a Surprise Guest" (now, obviously it might not be him, but there's a fair chance it could be...) at the latest Damian Barr’s Literary Salon which is being held at the Liberty Hall at Ace Hotel, New York, on Saturday April 9th at 8pm, with doors opening at 7:30pm.

Polly is there for the US launch of the paperback of her critically acclaimed novel The Kindness. She will also discuss her work as a lyricist on The Division Bell, On An Island, The Endless River and Rattle That Lock. Jonathan Lee is a British novelist living in New York. Polly and Jonathan will give readings and be interviewed by Damian who will take questions. There will then be a short interval before their final, surprise, guest. You can buy books on the night and there will be a signing afterwards.

Tickets - priced at $15.00 - are on sale now from the Eventbrite website.

UPDATE: Before either of the above, this coming Wednesday, March 23rd, David and Polly are in conversation with book critic and author David Ulin in Los Angeles. The event takes place at 7:30pm at The Last Bookstore, 453 S Spring Street, and more details can be found at LastBookstoreLA.com.

The event is free, with seating and standing room available on a first-come-first-served basis.

Italy’s Minister of Culture, Dario Franceschini, revealed the news on Wednesday (via a tweet on Twitter) that David Gilmour is lined up to perform two nights in the ancient Roman town on Pompeii, near Naples, Italy, this summer, and this morning, full details of David Gilmour's Pompeii concerts have now been confirmed.

Forty-five years after Pink Floyd appeared there, to film Live At Pompeii, David will be back at the preserved town, which was buried under ash for over 1,600 years after Vesuvius erupted in A.D.79.

The stone amphitheatre - the earliest known to have been built from stone - was built around 80 B.C. to hold gladiator fights, and around a century later, Rome's Colosseum was built. It should be a wonderful place to see David's show, and the pair of dates will be the first attended rock concerts to ever take place in the location.

David said: "I want to thank the Ministry of Culture for giving me the opportunity to once again play this beautiful and historic venue. Performing there in 1971 was very special and I'm looking forward to returning and hopefully creating some more memorable moments made even more special by playing to an audience."

Dario Franceschini, Minister of Cultural Heritage and Tourism said: "45 years after the legendary 'Live at Pompeii' David Gilmour will be back performing in a unique, fascinating, beautiful scenario. The myth of Pink Floyd will come back to life with him in Pompeii. It will be a show that can't be missed."

Prof. Massimo Osanna, superintendent of Pompeii, said: "The return of David Gilmour to Pompeii is an extraordinary event that the Superintendence and the Heritage Ministry have strongly wanted. Pompeii is now experiencing a real rebirth and is ready to welcome this amazing artist who, together with his band, made the music history of this century and at the same time left a deep mark on the history of the Pompeii site with his memorable show behind closed doors in 1971. Once again the Amphitheatre will be a privileged set for this show and we are sure that as happened in 1971 it will generate the same magical atmosphere and the same big emotions that only the unique combination of a place with no time like Pompeii with marvelous music can create. It is really an extraordinary opportunity which comes from the past and writes in the present a chapter of 'music history inside history'."

Tickets for the concerts - which start at 9pm each evening - go on sale on Tuesday, (March 22nd) at 13:00hrs CET from www.DavidGilmour.com. In efforts clearly designed to stop the ticket touts, there are some important ticketing restrictions in place.

Tickets are limited to a maximum of two per person for one show only (not both) and are priced at €300 each plus 15% booking fee. The purchaser will get a receipt with his or her name on it, and must present this to the box office on site, with photographic ID and the card used to purchase the ticket(s). If two tickets have been bought, the additional person must also be present. Each ticket holder will then be presented with a ticket and a wristband, and both must be shown to security to enter the site (the wristband must be worn at the time).

Our thanks to everyone who contacted us as news of these shows broke, first on Twitter, then on the Italian media. We purposefully held off posting about the shows until we had all the details for you, including the all-important ticketing info.

Tracks Auctions are holding a Beatles And Rock 'n Roll Memorabilia Auction with bidding starting on March 24th at 4pm GMT, with three items of interest to Syd Barrett and Pink Floyd fans.

Lot 72 is one of two extremely rare offerings - a ticket to Two Young Painters, an exhibition in 1964 at the Lion & Lamb in Milton, Cambridgeshire showcasing the emerging talents of Anthony Stern and Roger Barrett. The ticket comes with a letter from Stern giving the background to the exhibition. The starting bid is £200, with an estimate for this lot to sell for between £200 - £400.

Lot 73 is part of a larger lot of items that was originally purchased from the Cheffins Fine Art and Antique sale held in November 2006 through which the estate of Barrett was sold. On offer here is a collection of art material that includes an empty jar of insignia red enamel paint, a clip-on metal two-cup paint mixer, three different grades of pencils, a blue pen, a paint brush and a box of nine fountain pen nibs. The starting bid is just £1 with an estimate of £100 - £300.

Finally, lot 74 is an original Wall Performed Live programme from 1980, signed on the front by Roger Waters, David Gilmour, Richard Wright and Nick Mason. To get all four signatures (which appear genuine) together is unusual, and the starting bid for this is a slightly hefty £500, with an estimate of £500 - £1000.

At 4pm GMT on Thursday 24th March internet bidding will be opened. Bidders can register beforehand, log-in and then place bids on their site, www.tracksauctions.com. At 2pm GMT on Sunday 3rd April bidding will be paused for 1 hour, before the live online bidding begins at 3pm.

Released today, on the day of his 70th birthday, is the full video for David Gilmour's In Any Tongue, a definite highlight of the current concert tour and the album, Rattle That Lock.

On David's website, there's an explanation of how the absorbing animation came about: "Aubrey 'Po' Powell, David's Creative Director, was looking for a talented animator to work on a video for The Girl In The Yellow Dress, and discovered in America a young film maker named Danny Madden, whose short film Confusion Through Sand had won recognition at the 2014 SXSW Film Festival. Po was so taken with the work that he showed it to David and lyricist Polly Samson, who immediately employed Danny to make the Yellow Dress film. However, David and Polly had also written In Any Tongue about the futility of war, and by chance some of the illustrations in Danny's film fitted the mood exactly. Danny gave his permission to use an edited part of Confusion Through Sand to fit In Any Tongue, and the die was cast."

Without further ado, here's the video itself, which will be familiar (albeit in a reduced, circular format on Mr Screen) to those who saw almost any of David's 2015 shows. The one night which it didn't feature was the Orange, France show, which didn't have any video playback on Mr Screen due to the nature of the venue.