Gilmore & Roberts plus Lucy Kitchen

The Big Comfy Bookshop proudly presents the award winning acoustic evening 'Comfy & Acoustic'. Intimate performances from the best UK (and beyond) musicians covering folk, Americana, singer-songwriters and roots

Gilmore & Roberts

Contemporary folk/acoustic duo Gilmore & Roberts combine award-winning songwriting with astounding musicianship and their trademark harmonies to create a powerful wall of sound. Nominated three times at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, Katriona Gilmore (fiddle, mandolin) and Jamie Roberts (guitar) met while studying at Leeds College of Music and released their debut album in 2008.

Since then, the duo have toured Canada and mainland Europe, played some of the UK’s biggest acoustic festivals, toured with folk rock legends Fairport Convention and won countless accolades for their genre-spanning work.

2015 saw the release of their fourth album, Conflict Tourism, which appeared on several end-of-year Best Album lists and received national airplay on both BBC Radio 2 & BBC 6music. Produced by Mark Tucker and featuring Matt Downer (Jamie Smith’s Mabon), Phil Henry (Phillip Henry & Hannah Martin) and James ‘Hutch’ Hutchinson (Bonnie Raitt), Conflict Tourism packs a considered punch from start to finish.

In 2016, the duo marked a decade of performing together with their first live album, released ten years to the day since their first EP launch. Limited to one thousand hand-numbered copies and recorded on the duo’s 2016 spring tour, In Our History – LIVE is available exclusively at shows and from gilmoreroberts.co.uk/shop.

Katriona Gilmore grew up in Knebworth, Hertfordshire, learned violin at school and started playing local folk clubs with her guitarist father at the age of 14. Starting her professional career with folk pop sensations Tiny Tin Lady and singer songwriter Rosie Doonan, she was invited to be part of a new lineup of The Albion Band in 2011 and subsequently joined Albion frontman Blair Dunlop on his solo tours. In 2017 Katriona joined established folk-roots band The Willows. Katriona has featured on many acclaimed albums as a session musician and has appeared onstage with such diverse acts as The Troggs, Kim Richey and Matt Berry.

Jamie Roberts was brought up in Barnsley, South Yorkshire in a musical family – his sister Kathryn Roberts is a well-respected singer on the UK folk scene. Jamie joined young English traditionalists Kerfuffle in 2007, formed The Dovetail Trio with Rosie Hood and Matt Quinn in 2014, and joined the critically acclaimed Emily Askew Band in 2016. Alongside his regular projects, he has performed with Nancy Kerr’s Sweet Visitor Band and Blackbeard’s Tea Party amongst others.

Lucy Kitchen

In the search for touchstones Lucy is often compared to the likes of Joni Mitchell, Beth Orton and, vocally, to Sandy Denny - ‘Lucy’s vocal tone has hints of the late Sandy Denny in it – a rare and precious thing indeed’ (bestnewbands.com), but her sound is all her own. 

Sun to My Moon opens with the track of the same name, a call for a lover ‘Sun to my moon, rain in my sea, I called out for you, the wind carried you to me’, followed by the crashing, swirling emotion of ‘Searching for Land’. ‘Lovers in Blue’ features stunning strings, and the ethereal ‘Summer Queen’ builds from delicate piano and acoustic guitar to full band and back again. She says of the album “There's a theme of loss but how, within that, love somehow pulls us through. There's also I guess for me the vibe that I veer towards the moon - the darker, questioning side and a lot of the songs on the album have come out of a hard couple of years personally but also within that amazing things have happened as a result.”

Since her last album, Waking, Lucy has been in demand as a vocalist, working with a number of electronic music acts to write and record songs that have been championed by the likes of BBC Radio 1 and Mixmag. She’s also performed on the John Peel Stage at Glastonbury festival.

Stage Times
Lucy Kitchen 8.00 - 8.40
Gilmore & Roberts 9.00

The bookshop bar will be open serving hot and cold drinks, wine and beer plus snacks. 
No other food or drink to be brought into the premises.
For details of the bookshop please visit
www.thebigcomfybookshop.co.uk
www.facebook.com/thebigcomfybookshop
www.twitter.com/bigcomfybooks
www.instagram.com/bigcomfybooks
www.bigcomfysessions.com

NOTE: If you are late you'll have to wait for the acts to finish their set/song to avoid interrupting the performance