Approximately in the Key of C

This is a deft title. Tony Curtis lifts his voice away from the expected and sings in a key that demonstrates, once again, that he is his own man. However, there is nothing approximate in his use of language, which is always, note for note, exact and true. By turns playful, funny, and deeply serious, these poems find the music that makes us most human.

[Tony Curtis's] poems are intimate revelations of a significance we can hardly imagine. In his imagination Curtis lives on the borderline between our world and the world of the spirits.

Tony Curtis's humour and charm, and ability to turn a poem with the seemingly simplest of images, and that understanding of how words will play over the listener's ear, are hallmarks which are pleasingly brought to the fore on the page... His greatest skill is to make readers go 'yes, of course'; he reminds us of what we've known all along though perhaps not recognised, and reading his poems is therefore an uplifting experience.