The Scotsman

Joseph’s music casts its spell in a magical hall of mirrors

- FIONA SHEPHERD

Kathryn Joseph Tramway, Glasgow

Music and theatre have long been happy creative bedfellows, with each medium feeding off the other’s particular energy. We’ve grown as accustomed to seeing bands on stage rocking out as part of the dramatic action as to watching musicians create touring theatrical spectacula­rs.

The partnering of spectral songwriter Kathryn Joseph with Glasgow’s music/theatre crossover specialist­s Cryptic is an inspired marriage, spawning this intense, intimate, immaculate­ly stylised presentati­on of Joseph’s new album From When I Wake the Want Is directed by Josh Armstrong and performed by joseph from start to finish.

Joseph makes music to lean in to anyway but from the outset the standing audience were craning their necks to fathom what was involved in James Johnson’s striking hall of mirrors stage set, a beautifull­y conceived attraction in its own right, with vertical strips surroundin­g Joseph’s fabulous upright piano organ and a couple of quirky black candelabra made from the limbs of anglepoise lamps.

Joseph, stately in a pink and yellow dress created by body architect Marketa Kratochvil­ova, normally eyeballs her audience intently as she performs but she began the show facing away into one of the mirrors, fixing her stare by reflection.

Joseph often describes herself as a crazy witch but there is nothing malevolent about the spell she casts with her mesmeric music. For the next hour, she held the audience rapt with a skeletal suite of heartbreak and hope, only occasional­ly breaking the reverie by rising from her piano stool to sip from a wine glass slotted into one of the spidery sculptures.

Her quavery, vulnerable voice came close to griefstric­ken ululation on Tell My Lover, masking a darker, obsessive message about hanging on to a relationsh­ip like a possession.

She moved from fragile, circular patterns on the piano to delicate legato notes and onwards into the satisfying lament We Have Been Loved By Our Mothers before ending on a sweet heartfelt tribute to her daughter and her partner.

Joseph’s child woman tones are often compared to Kate Bush and, though she cannot match her songwritin­g genius, this exquisite piece came over like a solo chamber version of Bush’s 2014 London residency, doused in Nich Smith’s monochroma­tic lighting design of deep warm blues, violets and pinks which complement­ed the meticulous­ly pitched arc of the music.

Tolbooth, Stirling tonight, Perth Concert Hall, 17 September

 ??  ?? Kathryn Joseph held the audience rapt with a skeletal suite of heartbreak and hope
Kathryn Joseph held the audience rapt with a skeletal suite of heartbreak and hope

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