NORTHUMBRIAN MUSIC
NIGHTS
What we said about
BILL JONES
BILL JONES finds her welly in Allendale
As emerging voices go, Bill Jones sounded at first to me like a strong woman artiste trying to throw off the shackles of an enthusiastic little girl's fading fragile lisps. That was on the first several numbers, sitting behind her keyboard, last Friday evening at the King's Head in Allendale, when this feted young musician gave an energetic boost to the local Women with Welly programme.
After all, 'The mist-covered mountains of home' and 'Storm Cree' did convey a certain nostalgia for one's youth. But that little girl's voice began to evaporate as Bill opened her mouth and breathed as deeply as her accordian bellows on 'Nell the Cabin Boy', which said as much for the heroism of women in unexpected circumstances as any contemporary number could.
All of which set up her audience nicely for an a capella rendition of the 'Fair flow'r of Northumberland', which was soft and affecting and lovely. If Bill is a young entertainer, she demonstrated the breadth of her experience, confidently holding her own throughout the night by mixing in a variety of approaches to her music, whether with a flute-borne 'Busking Set', or later a lively pair of tunes on the penny whistle.
'Turn to me', the title track from her new CD, which Mike Harding has been playing a lot recently on his BBC Radio 2 programme, was a composite of a traditional tune with Bill's own new words, and it rounded off the set nicely with a strong sense of a young woman's growing maturity implicit in the lyrics.
Contrast that sentiment with the growing sense of betrayal in 'Loving Hannah', and we began to understand what all the excitement is about. When Bill throws her heart into a song, it begins to live with a pure and unalloyed tone and just enough grace notes to catch the lump in her listeners' throats.
Some moments and songs really sneak up on you unawares, and 'Do not wake me' was one such. As show stoppers go, this one has to be right up there with any of the best ballads, and it provided a convincing answer, if any might have wondered, why young Bill Jones was included in the Women with Welly programme. The number elicited enthusiastic calls for another, and on her last humorous piece Bill was rewarded with an attentive percussion accompaniment from the friendly folks at the bar.
Altogether a joy and a privilege to participate in the growth and development of a young musician seeking to make her living in the professional arena.
