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24 - 26 August 2012
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MARTHA TILSTON
The Centre Stage, Bournemouth
5 May 2011

Following on from her superlative performance at the popular Purbeck Folk Festival last year and fresh from a tour of Australia, Cornwall based songstress Martha Tilston headlined at the prestigious Bournemouth Folk Club. As daughter of acclaimed singer/songwriter Steve Tilston, Martha has an envied musical background but has made her own mark writing beautiful songs about any subject that stirs her feelings. She has a gorgeously clear singing voice and completely captivated the large Thursday evening audience. Martha was supported by Matt Tweed from her band The Woods, whose guitar, mandolin and bass playing complemented her vocals and light fingered guitar style perfectly.

Opening with a couple of numbers from her album ‘TILL I REACH THE SEA; Night Rambling and Falcon, Martha then switched to her latest offering LUCY AND THE WOLVES with the beautiful ballad My Chair, ‘a song not about the past or future but right now’. Artificial, ‘for anyone that’s worked in an office’ was followed by the traditional folk song Willy of Winsbury and Staircase, about a dream which suggested there were more rooms in the house, before the first set closed with another ‘happy’ number, Seagull.

The second set got off to a great start with Martha showing her versatility on the grand piano with The Cape, the opening track from LUCY AND THE WOLVES and following a long piano introduction, a truncated version of Firewood. The terrific ballad Music of the Moon, about being ‘lagooned’ on a beach in Spain with a bottle of wine but no corkscrew, was followed by Mary and the Prince from OF MILKMAIDS & ARCHITECTS. Lucy and the great love song Firefly led to a new song Silent Women ‘for women around the world who’ve been silenced’. Martha certainly doesn’t shy away from politically sensitive subjects! Lily of the West from her 2003 album ROLLING, which had Martha momentarily losing her memory, was followed by Red, a strange tale of Red Riding Hood, before she closed with Old Tom Cat, her ode to Leonard Cohen. The audience literally screamed for more and were rewarded when she returned to encore with Good World which had a few of her devotees dancing in what little space was available at the back of the hall. Martha was not finished yet and came off the stage to sing the poignant Silver Dagger a cappella. Amazing stuff!

It was great to see an artist with such a wonderful stage presence and perfect singing voice just doing what she does well. Her introductions were extremely well structured and set the scene graphically. Her perfect singing voice ensured that every word could be heard clearly.

Opening for Martha were young trio Holika from Bournemouth University who were making their Bournemouth Folk Club debut. Yet another superb evening’s entertainment at the BFC.

John Roffey