Half a century ago a small plane carrying four people crashed into a frozen Iowa cornfield, killing it's four passengers and one of the brightest young musicians of all time.

Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, JP ‘the Big Bopper’ Richardson and pilot Roger Peterson all perished on February 3, 1959, but their memory lives on and in no place is it more revered than in West End Musical Buddy, which comes to Fairfield Halls next week as part of a nine-month UK tour.

Celebrating the best of his and the Crickets music the show has two actors playing Buddy on alternate nights and one of them knows Croydon very well indeed, having grown up in the borough and gone to Cumnor House School and Trinity.

"I used to take the 151 bus past Fairfield Halls every day to school so it's a bit surreal to be going back and performing the lead in a show there now," said Oliver Seymour-Marsh.

And what a lead it is to be playing.

"It's a dream come true to be playing such a big part," insisted Oliver.

"To be honest I didn't really know all that much about Buddy when I started but I researched and I liked what I learned.

"He has so many hit songs that people have heard and even 50 years after his death he still sells out theatres because people come for the music and to lose themselves in the whole 50s genre.

"You realise Buddy had such a big influence on so many musicians, including The Beatles and anyone who says they are interested in music needs to know where it comes from and should listen to him.

"The tour has been really great and we've been going since last October.

"The difficult thing is to keep it fresh. How do you make every night seem new and different?

"It's a small cast though so we do as much as we can to keep it alive and you try something different every night.

"Because all the music is live too no two shows are the same, something always goes wrong."

Buddy, Fairfield Halls, May 5 to 9, various times, £23.50 to £25.50. Call 020 8688 9291 or visit fairfield.co.uk.