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karinepolwart.com
Review by Kara Filbey
This was Karine’s first proper gig in 2 years and
for loyal fans and new listeners like myself it wasn’t
a disappointment. The pleasure of being on stage once more
was obvious and after producing 2 new albums and a baby
son in the last year, you can only feel admiration!!
The structure of the gig was unlike any I’d been
to before and was brought about due to the support act,
Edinburgh singer/songwriter Kim Edgar using the same band
of musicians as Karine, giving the evening a continuity
and flow which was really nice to see. The two met at the
Burnsong Song House in 2006, and contributed to each other’s
sets, with Kim’s beautiful piano playing adding much
to the evening. I particularly enjoyed the song ‘Red’
which is the opening track on her newly released album ‘butterflies
and broken glass’.
Karine and her band followed on with a showcase of many
new songs from her album ‘This Earthly Spell’.
Haunting, thought-provoking and extremely beautiful, hearing
these tracks live was a real treat. It was good to hear
of the inspiration behind some of her song writing, which
gave my favourite song on the album ‘Rivers Run’
even more poignancy – a sweet and hopeful song to
her son as he grows up. ‘Better Things’ is a
demonstration of Polwart’s involvement in the anti-nuclear
weapons campaign in Scotland and the lyrics mourn the loss
of the beautiful, noble creations of man to the deadly and
ugly. The song ‘Firethief’ was written for a
BBC documentary involving a mother who had lost her son
to AIDS - a very moving song.
The only criticism I can muster is that there weren’t
more of the traditional songs featured on her other new
album ‘Fairest Floo’er’. She performed
‘The Learig’ and ‘Dowie Dens of Yarrow’
with grace and strength, and there was a real contrast of
just her and the piano from the entire band on the other
songs. I would have loved to hear more.
A wonderful comeback gig from a very talented Scottish
song-writer.
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