Based in South-East London, Amy Hollinrake has been gradually building a solid name for herself on the London music scene and beyond. She has picked up some valued support and recognition along the way, winning the Bert Jansch award in 2018 and was awarded an EFDSS grant in 2021 to create new work of contemporary cultural relevance for women’s voices.
In her work, she draws on her influence and affinity with women’s experience presented in folklore, poetry and literature. She was able to develop this further during the lockdown as a researcher and founder of the feminist cataloguing project ‘Loathly Lady’, an ambitious idea to create an online catalogue of female identity in folk songs and ballads that is due to be launched later this year.
Ahead of her debut gig at Cambridge Junction this Saturday (26th Feb), we have the pleasure of sharing a live session recorded at Beckenham Place. Supported by her band, she performs It Draws the Same, which highlights both her striking vocals and complimentary folk-jazz-tinged arrangements, co-arranged here with Ben Smith (Keys). The resulting sound is quite breathtaking, with Bertie Atkinson’s percussion adding an undercurrent of emotional turbulence, aided by Freddie Willetts’ double bass and Joesph Perkins’ acoustic guitar, a continued presence throughout. Evie Hilyer-Ziegler’s beautiful violin playing counterbalances this with some airy-melancholic moments, all of which are underpinned by Smith’s keys. It’s an exceptional and inventive performance.
She tells us:
I am inspired a lot by folklore, literature and poetry, and ‘It Draws The Same’ came out of a realisation that so many stories I was reading in folk songs and ballads were about women drowning. I was looking at that famous painting of Ophelia by Millais and researching murder ballads when I came across an interesting analysis of female death in folk songs. It talked about a kind of liberation in women’s suicide, in escaping her murder, and looking at that picture of Ophelia, so serene, I felt almost a seduction for that sense of freedom, which is what ultimately inspired me to write the song. I guess then the song is an ode to Ophelia as well as a critique of the way women are depicted in folksong and ballads. “When the waters too light it wears you out”.
Musically the sound is a mix of folk, with jazz-inflected rhythms and synth textures. I like finding subtle synergies between the old and new. Someone at one of my shows said to me recently it was a bit like a Fairport Convention for the 21st Century, which summed it up pretty well. The video features my band of Ben Smith on synth, Evie Hilyer Ziegler on violin, Joseph Perkins on guitar keeping that relentless riff solid throughout, Freddie Willetts on Double Bass and Bertie Atkinson on Drums.
Don’t miss Amy Hollinrake at Cambridge Junction this Saturday, 26th February 2022. Tickets and more information here: https://www.junction.co.uk/new-routes-february
Web: https://www.amyhollinrake.com/