Birmingham cult hero returns for hometown gig.
From intimate sold out club gigs to both playing and compering Glastonbury and being given a standing ovation at Fairport Convention’s 50th anniversary Cropredy Festival, the irrepressibly exuberant Gerry Colvin is not just a folk-pop legend, he’s one of this country’s finest songwriters and a sensational live performer with more energy than your average power station.
Capable of bringing a tear to your eye or stoking a fire in your heart, his thoughtful, playful, insightful, compassionate and inevitably melodically infectious songs speak to anyone who’s ever felt the passion and pain of love, to those enraged by the injustices of today’s society and to those who’ve ever wished they owned Johnny Cash’s shirt.
And now he and his band, along with a clutch of special guests, are headlining what is guaranteed to be a show to remember at Birmingham’s Crescent Theatre on Saturday November 23rd.
Celebrating his fourth decade of making music, Gerry started out with Birmingham-based 70s indie jazz outfit The Man Upstairs before co-founding skiffle-cowpunk indie outfit Terry & Gerry in the early 80s, championed by John Peel, appearing on The Old Grey Whistle Test and seeing all of their five singles and debut album top the indie charts.
Returning from a stint as professional songwriter in Nashville in the early 90s, he collaborated with Alison Moyet, had huge success with The Gerry Colvin’s Inexperience and The Atlantics before, in 1995, joining forces with Nick Quarmby to form Colvinquarmby, going on to release six critically acclaimed albums, be voted best band at the 2009 Cropredy Festival and, in 2010, win the Hancock Award for Best Live Folk Act.
Now fronting the five-piece Gerry Colvin Band, featuring Jerome Davies on double bass, accordionist Trish Power, Lyndon Webb on guitar and violinist Michael Keelan, together they’ve released two albums while Gerry also has a solo jazz album to his name: as well as a eight album back catalogue.
For the Crescent Theatre concert on November 23rd, The Gerry Colvin Band will be joined by special guests Marion Fleetwood and The GCB Folk choir as well as five string players, horn players Mick O’Brien and Sarah Gail Brand from Inexperience, Paul Johnston, formerly drummer with Warwickshire folk rock outfit Meet On The Ledge, and, on backing vocals, Nashville singer-songwriter Jane Pearl, Anna Ryder and a reunion with Jackie Walters who was also in Inexperience and went on to be part of Birmingham girl soul trio Asia Blue.
And, as if the promise of one of the gigs of the year wasn’t enough, the whole thing is being filmed and recorded so everyone in the audience gets to be given a backing vocal credit.
