Inga Simpson on her love letter to cricket and music 'Willowman'

Allan Reader is one of the last traditional bat-makers and is struggling to keep the family business alive in a small workshop in Melbourne. When gifted young batter Todd Harrow catches Allan's eye, he selects the best piece of willow he's harvested in years to make a Reader bat for him. As Harrow charts a meteoric rise to the highest echelons of the sport, Allan's magical bat takes centre stage, awakening something special in both men. But in cricket, as in life, nothing is guaranteed and with great success comes the spectre of failure and the strain it places on relationships – and the human body. Willowman is a love letter to the art and beauty of cricket and a meditation on the inner lives of men and women, for whom cricket is a way of life. In this episode Gregory Dobbs chats to Inga Simpson about the miracle timber that is white willow, the glory and the tragedy of a life in cricket, the relationship between the sport, music and the art of crafting cricket bats, and the real people that were the inspiration for this remarkable story.