June Tabor w/ Andy Cutting, Mark Emerson, Tim Harries


Tolbooth, Stirling 1.12.07


Lineage: SP Binaurals > B Box > Edirol RO-9 > Soundforge (edits)


Sorry, no idea about track names. Any help appreciated.


Press Review of gig:


I was a little concerned at going to see June Tabor on this tour as the wonderful Huw Warren wasn’t playing. I also hadn’t enjoyed her most recent release ‘Apples’ as much as previous ones (possibly due again to the lack of Mr Warren). The band would be a four-piece with the fabulous Andy Cutting on accordion, Tim Harries on double bass and Mark Emmerson on violin and taking Huw’s place on the piano for some songs.

However, I needn’t have worried. June’s voice and the choice of songs were as usual wonderful (although I did feel the set was a bit downbeat and could have done with a Les Barker tune or two!) and while Mark wasn’t Huw, he did a pretty good job on the piano when he played it.

She opened with On an April Morning which is one of my favourite traditional songs and continued on with an Aberdeenshire song Rigs of Rye – although some sources are trying to convince me that it’s actually an Irish song. However, if it’s Irish then why does it mention that the couple live in Brechin and Montrose? Anyway, it is a nice song. There were several Andy Cutting instrumentals, which while nice were all a bit of a muchness. Good though. We were also treated to a trio of songs about migrant workers, from a short collection of gypsy pieces, to a Jewish sweatshop worker Morris Rosenfeld (My Resting Place), to Mexican fruit pickers in America, killed in a plane crash – a song by Woodie Guthrie.

She played quite a lot of songs from her latest release ‘Apples’, which I enjoyed a lot more live. Rigs of Rye (see above) is from Apples, and she also played Speak Easy with lyrics by Burns, a traditional channel islands song ‘Ce Fu en Mai’ that dates back to perhaps the eleventh century and the sailor’s prayer by Christopher Somerville ‘Send Us a Quiet Night’. She also played my favourite from that album, ‘The Dancing’ – about the Saturday night dances held in industrial towns where the workers in the mills would go each week. A slightly more uptempo song was ‘Oh! Alas I am in Love’, which is recorded on At the Wood’s Heart (to my ears a much better record than Apples) and a very old traditional piece from a play originally I think. Also from At The Wood’s Heart is ‘Lie Near Me’, the tune of a traditional dance with added words which were smoothed over by Burns again.

The highlight of the evening for me was ‘A Proper Sort of Gardner’ by Maggie Holland. I love the two Maggie Holland songs that June has recorded (the other being A Place Called England – what a wonderful song that is, but not exactly appropriate for singing in Scotland) and I was delighted to hear it. June introduced two songs about gardens, starting with Andy Cutting’s ‘Walled Garden’ instrumental and I was praying that this song would follow. And it did.

Once again, a superb gig by one of folk music’s most brilliant singers. I wish I’d gone to the Edinburgh gig as well, or to the Gateshead gig the following night. However, I suppose an occasional trip into June’s voice makes it more special than if I see her many times. She’s to play in Glasgow for Celtic Connections in early 2008, maybe I shall take a trip up for that.