Music
Kathryn Roberts & Sean Lakeman
Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh
Rob Adams
four stars
JONATHAN the 184-year-old tortoise will probably never know that Kathryn Roberts and Sean Lakeman have put words in his mouth. Whether this venerable inhabitant of St Helena cares about such matters is neither here nor there. It is, however, another example of how a song idea can arrive in Roberts’ imagination and the couple’s songcraft and musicality will turn it into something rather special, and in this case quite charming despite its introduction as being "a bit daft".
The ideas come from all sorts of sources – something their daughter Lily said about school, a passage in a Terry Pratchett novel, the legend behind the naming of Antwerp – but the results are entirely consistent.
It possibly helps that Roberts and Lakeman have studied great songwriters closely; Sandy Denny’s Solo, sung beautifully early on by Roberts, and Warren Zevon’s For My Next Trick I’ll Need a Volunteer were two examples of their favourites delivered here. The folksong tradition is also part of this process as, in addition to singing the Child ballad Child Owlet, they’ve turned the Pratchett quote and the story of a lonely whale, 52 Hertz, into songs that could easily become source material of the future.
All of this wide range is presented with a genuine warmth of personality, wonderfully clear, honest singing from Roberts, and expert guitar accompaniment from Lakeman, a man who knows when to apply a rockin’ attack and when to let the song carry its own momentum or embellish with precise delicacy. With Roberts adding understated keyboard and occasional flute they’re entirely self-sufficient, a travelling show of no little folk wisdom and generous entertainment.
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