An Evening with Mary Chapin Carpenter, Julie Fowlis, and Karine Polwart Festival Theatre Edinburgh 7th March 2025 Review
An Evening with Mary Chapin Carpenter, Julie Fowlis, and Karine Polwart at the Festival Theatre Edinburgh tonight was the penultimate show in the current tour to promote collaborative album project “Looking For The Thread”. This sold-out show should actually have been the last one, but an extra show was put on for Saturday 8th March due to demand. This extra show has also sold out.
The reason behind this project could not have been a simpler one – these three singer/songwriters simply wanted to work together, to make music together, and the end results are a blend of individual talent and team work. It is clear though from the album and tonight’s show that many of these songs have still retained the individuality of each artist whilst also allowing room for working with one another.
The format for this show was a simple one - perform the songs from the album and also leave enough room for each artist to highlight, with the other two on backing vocals/harmonies, some of their own songs which are not on this album. Adding much to the sound and atmosphere of this evening’s music was a hugely talented band consisting of Steven Polwart (guitar), Euan Burton (electric and upright bass), Chris Vatalaro (drums, percussion) and Rob Burger (keyboards, organ, accordion, and more).
The track listing for “Looking for the Thread” is as at the bottom of this review. Normally I will not list this in a live review but the two are so closely linked here and the live show was often informing the audience as to the background of these songs and how they came about.
The set opened with all three artists pretty much lined up on stage with Mary Chapin Carpenter (centre), Karine Polwart (left) and Julie Fowlis (right) as viewed by the audience and this never changed all evening. Although one would be on lead vocals (depending upon the song) the other two were never far away on harmonies. Singing in harmony with other singers is an obvious passion and joy for Mary Chapin Carpenter who was happy to proclaim, even if the comment was a little non-pc, that she was a “harmony slut”. That level of humour, respect for each other, and sheer pleasure of having worked together on this project, recording the album and touring was obviously just such a shared experience of joy for all three of these singer/songwriters. There is not space in this review to go through every song performed tonight, so I am instead selecting a few highlights for me.
Opening the show, Julie Fowlis took her inspiration from old Gaelic stories (telling us the story too) and “Grà dh Geal Mo Chridhe”. Folklore was to be the inspiration later for another song about a revered, almost mystical creature, the salmon, and “Silver In The Blue”.
Karine Polwart has a very distinctive style of writing that draws inspiration from diverse sources including someone spray painting their name on the partial stump of an old tree – “Rebecca”. Not exactly a who-done-it we were told. Older songs had their place in tonight’s music too, and Karine Polwart reprising her 2009 song “Daisy” made this a very personal song reflecting upon her daughter’s own growing into reflection of the character in this song over the years.
Proving that inspiration for a song can come from anywhere, Mary Chapin Carpenter chose a satellite fated to become nothing more than space junk with “Satellite”. The ability to imagine this object trying to get back home to earth and write the song from this point of view for me shows what an imaginative and unique songwriter Mary Chapin Carpenter is.
Getting some of the biggest applause from the audience tonight and taking us a little into the arena of current political events was Mary Chapin Carpenter’s 1992 song “The Hard Way” with that classic line, “Actions Speak Louder”.
The closing song of this set (and the album) had a very simple, but very important message to everyone and the title said it all, “Send Love”.
This was simply an evening of live music with no gimmicks or distracting “special effects” from three very different singer/songwriters who all are highly skilled at their craft, backed by a band of first rate musicians and this audience could not get enough of it.
“Looking For The Thread” Track listing.
1 Grà dh Geal Mo Chridhe
2 A Heart That Never Closes
3 Rebecca
4 Looking For The Thread
5 Hold Everything
6 Silver In The Blue
7 You Know Where You Are
8 Satellite
9 Buidheann Mo Chridhe Clann Ualrig
10 Send Love
Review by Tom King © 2025
www.artsreviewsedinburgh.com
The reason behind this project could not have been a simpler one – these three singer/songwriters simply wanted to work together, to make music together, and the end results are a blend of individual talent and team work. It is clear though from the album and tonight’s show that many of these songs have still retained the individuality of each artist whilst also allowing room for working with one another.
The format for this show was a simple one - perform the songs from the album and also leave enough room for each artist to highlight, with the other two on backing vocals/harmonies, some of their own songs which are not on this album. Adding much to the sound and atmosphere of this evening’s music was a hugely talented band consisting of Steven Polwart (guitar), Euan Burton (electric and upright bass), Chris Vatalaro (drums, percussion) and Rob Burger (keyboards, organ, accordion, and more).
The track listing for “Looking for the Thread” is as at the bottom of this review. Normally I will not list this in a live review but the two are so closely linked here and the live show was often informing the audience as to the background of these songs and how they came about.
The set opened with all three artists pretty much lined up on stage with Mary Chapin Carpenter (centre), Karine Polwart (left) and Julie Fowlis (right) as viewed by the audience and this never changed all evening. Although one would be on lead vocals (depending upon the song) the other two were never far away on harmonies. Singing in harmony with other singers is an obvious passion and joy for Mary Chapin Carpenter who was happy to proclaim, even if the comment was a little non-pc, that she was a “harmony slut”. That level of humour, respect for each other, and sheer pleasure of having worked together on this project, recording the album and touring was obviously just such a shared experience of joy for all three of these singer/songwriters. There is not space in this review to go through every song performed tonight, so I am instead selecting a few highlights for me.
Opening the show, Julie Fowlis took her inspiration from old Gaelic stories (telling us the story too) and “Grà dh Geal Mo Chridhe”. Folklore was to be the inspiration later for another song about a revered, almost mystical creature, the salmon, and “Silver In The Blue”.
Karine Polwart has a very distinctive style of writing that draws inspiration from diverse sources including someone spray painting their name on the partial stump of an old tree – “Rebecca”. Not exactly a who-done-it we were told. Older songs had their place in tonight’s music too, and Karine Polwart reprising her 2009 song “Daisy” made this a very personal song reflecting upon her daughter’s own growing into reflection of the character in this song over the years.
Proving that inspiration for a song can come from anywhere, Mary Chapin Carpenter chose a satellite fated to become nothing more than space junk with “Satellite”. The ability to imagine this object trying to get back home to earth and write the song from this point of view for me shows what an imaginative and unique songwriter Mary Chapin Carpenter is.
Getting some of the biggest applause from the audience tonight and taking us a little into the arena of current political events was Mary Chapin Carpenter’s 1992 song “The Hard Way” with that classic line, “Actions Speak Louder”.
The closing song of this set (and the album) had a very simple, but very important message to everyone and the title said it all, “Send Love”.
This was simply an evening of live music with no gimmicks or distracting “special effects” from three very different singer/songwriters who all are highly skilled at their craft, backed by a band of first rate musicians and this audience could not get enough of it.
“Looking For The Thread” Track listing.
1 Grà dh Geal Mo Chridhe
2 A Heart That Never Closes
3 Rebecca
4 Looking For The Thread
5 Hold Everything
6 Silver In The Blue
7 You Know Where You Are
8 Satellite
9 Buidheann Mo Chridhe Clann Ualrig
10 Send Love
Review by Tom King © 2025
www.artsreviewsedinburgh.com