Bob Dylan is an artist who has never shied away from rearranging his music. So much so, that at concerts, it is often only through a recognition of a lyric that a song is identified.

But I don't think even he could have envisioned that music from more than 50 years of his back catalogue could be woven into a 1930s musical.

Yet that is what Conor McPherson has done in Girl From The North Country which is running Canterbury's Marlowe until this Saturday.

And what a flawless performance it was, with a brilliant cast metamorphosing seamlessly from acting into singing and dancing and playing instruments.

However, any Dylan aficionados hoping this is a story based upon the life of Suze Rotolo (or Echo Elstrom... or Bonnie Beecher... you pays your money, you takes your pick) who is believed to have inspired the song, will be disappointed.

This is a tale set in Bob's home town of Duluth in Minnesota in 1934 and in the middle of the Great Depression and seven years before the great songwriter was born.

Set in a rundown guesthouse - facing foreclosure - where we see characters who deal with dementia, adultery, racism, poverty. It should be a bleak tale.

But thanks to the fabulous music and subtle and not so subtle humour we are taken on an uplifting journey seen through the eyes of the downtrodden and never-say-die characters, including a doctor, a boxer, a bible salesman.

Among the songs to be enjoyed anew are Tight Connection To My Heart; Slow Train; Like A Rolling Stone; Jokerman; Hurricane; Idiot Wind and the wonderful Forever Young.

The 20-strong cast and on-stage band all do justice both to the play and the music, with some powerful performances which had the audience enthralled.

Keisha Amponsa Banson as Mrs Neilson; Justina Kehinde as the pregnant Marianne Laine and Joshua Jackson as the pugilist Joe Scott all cast a wonderful spell over the audience - but in fairness, the whole ensemble deserved their prolonged applause at the end.

The Irish playwright and director has had hits with The Weir, The Night Alive and The Seafarer - and this another.

So if you are a Dylan fan then it's a must-see and if you just want to see a musical with great singers, dancers.. then it's a definite must-see.

Girl From the North Country is at the Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury until Saturday, August 20.

Book online here or call 01227 787787.