Thea Gilmore's Wintertide

Thea Gilmore’s Wintertide.

The Sage, Gateshead , Hall 2.

Thea Gilmore’s ‘Wintertide’ has become something of a tradition these past three years since the release of her Strange Communion CD. Tonight’s show had sold out weeks ago, which was great to see.

Her husband, producer and singer songwriter in his own right, Nigel Stonier opened the show, demonstrating great musicianship and a sense of humour to match. He took us through a selection of his songs, including Love and that Sort of thing, A rainbow is Enough andMessing with fire, which he wrote with Claire Teal, but delivers with less of a jazz edge.

Where dd I go Rightis a new song hw wrote with an older country gent in mind whilst I Hope I Always is a touching love song– you can’t help but wonder if he had Thea in mind when he wrote it. I love the line ‘I know the path of rightrousness, I just don’t there much.’

Talking of how much they both love The Sage, he moved onto what for me were the two stand out tracks of his set, Josef’s Train and the tongue in cheek, music industry party inspired, Whole Lot of Nothing Going On. Brilliant.

Taking leave of the stage, he joked that he would use the break to metamorphose into Thea’s guitarist, ready for her set.

Thea took her place on the stage, surrounded by Christmas lights, snowflake projections and her Cd playing in the background. Immediately she joked, ‘She has a sexy voice, doesn’t she?!’ She told us, very genuinely, how great it was to be back at The Sage and welcomed us to Wintertide, remarking, ‘Another alone on the stage, Thea delivered a stunning solo version of Yoko Ono’s Listen, the Snow is Falling.This song fascinates me as not only is it beautiful, but listening on the CD you would think that the effects in Thea’s voice are created by technology, but when you see her live it is very much apparent she creates the effects herself. Very clever.

Nigel and Fluff, Thea’s longtime fiddle player joined her on stage and a set of banter began which ended up more like a comedy sketch between them. Thea went onyear gone by, ey?’

Standing to explain that she was originally going to record a Waterboys Christmas song, but was persuaded, by them to record Yoko Ono’s instead. As a result, she now sings their song live.

As her keyboard player came out to join them, Thea spoke about Don’t Stop Singing, her recent project of putting music to some newly discovered Sandy Denny lyrics. In deciding whether to agree to take part, she told us she had to ask herself how she would feel as a writer to decide whether Sandy would have approved. Then followed a rousing version of Don’t Stop Singing,which in many ways seems to me to sum both women up.

Joking about how it seems to be seasonally prophetic every year as she always gets one, she and the band launched into Cold Coming, giving it an almost sinister edge, along with a brilliant ending. Talking about Strange Communion, Thea spoke of wanting to make a seasonal, rather than Christmas, album. She was brought up Catholic, went to a Church of England School and deems herself Agnostic, but admitted to loving the season of Christmas. I have felt from first hearing it that it is more a CD of winter music, and in many ways, the better for it, as she does very much capture the spirit of the season, and very articulately.

Following the revelation that it is now considered that Jesus was born in October, an explanation was given as to how the Christians took over the Roman feast of Sol Invictus– the feast of the unconquered sun. What followed was the most stunning a capella performance I have ever heard in The Sage - testament both to her vocals and the acoustics in the room.

Nigel returned for I’ll be Home for Christmas and as Thea returned to her guitar, a lovely surprise followed; their five year old son, Egan, who joined them to play fiddle, with Fluff, on their next song. He was full of smiles, very confident and extremely cute, clearly loving being out on stage with his Mum. He obviously takes after his two musical parents!

On the subject of children, Thea returned to Sandy Denny to sing a song she now finds difficult as a mother; a lullabye called Georgia, which she wrote for her baby daughter not long before she died. By this time Georgia was living with her father and Sandy was deemed ‘unsafe,’ yet it is obvious from the lyrics how much she loved that little girl. Very moving. You could almost sense Sandy Denny’s spirit in the room with us, singing along with Thea, very much approving of what she had done with the lyrics.

Glad Tidings of Comfort and Joy very much suited her voice and left me wondering if we might persuade her to do a second seasonal CD? This was followed by her telling us how in further evidence that the Sage are great, they had left mince pies in her dressing room. Wanting to share them, she designated a man in the front row as ‘mince pie monitor’ to send them round and give her mince pie status updates. This caused great hilarity and really, is just typical of Thea; she is so down to earth and in tune with her audience.

She sang December in New York for the people sat behind her, who she joked had had the less pleasant view all evening. I have loved this song from first hearing it before it also found its way onto Strange Communion. This was then followed with the upbeat You’re the Radio, from the Murphy’s Heart CD. I’ve been hearing this song in all kinds of places recently!

Speaking of which, it is an absolute mystery to me why the next song That’ll be Christmas, isn’t playing everywhere over the Christmas period. If ever a song deserved to become a seasonal classic…

The lights went out to create an ethereal setting for my favourite song of the evening, Midwinter Toast. To me this song somehow captures the bittersweet element of the season, especially New Year; ‘it’s been a crazy year, but through all the damage done, I have turned and I have learned to make next year a better one.’

The set ended with the very cleverly worded St Stephen’s Day Murders, delivered with more than just a hint of attitude!

As an encore Thea took us back in time to sing This Girl is Taking Bets, at the end of which she stepped back to allow Nigel and Fluff to trade ‘riffs.’ Asking if anyone fancied singing she led us into the gorgeous Old December, where she had us deliver the‘sing, sing, sing for old December’ part, over and over. I have to admit it did sound rather lovely.

Making a point of telling us how lucky we are to have The Sage (she’d love to take it with her), she also thanked us for supporting live music, recognising that she couldn’t do it with us. Wishing us a Merry Christmas, she left the stage, promising to be back soon, and leaving us to sing, sing, sing to old December. So, Wintertide next year Thea? We’d love to have you before then, too, incidentally…