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NEWS! Christine Tobin has been nominated for the London Jazz Award 2011 at the London Awards for Arts & Performance 2011 visit www.londonfestivalfringe.com for more details
Great review of live duo gig with the wonderful Liam Noble. We were playing our take of the songs from Carole King's classic Tapestry album. This is a new project, "Tapestry Rewoven" so watch this space for more info. The review is on Sebastian Scotney's London Jazz site
http://londonjazz.blogspot.com/2009/08/live-christine-tobinliam-noble-carole.html
Another glowing review of that gig by Chris Parker
http://www.vortexjazz.co.uk/gig-reviews/2009/august/christine-tobin-tapestry.html
4**** REVIEW IN THE GUARDIAN FOR "SECRET LIFE OF A GIRL" CD see my blog for full review
CHRISTINE TOBIN "BEST VOCALIST BBC JAZZ AWARDS 2008"
Sings one of her songs with Nigel Kennedy at the Awards Ceremony, Mermaid Theatre, London.
Irish-born singer-songwriter Christine Tobin is based in the UK and spends her time between London and the beautiful Kent coast. Her work is firmly rooted in a tradition that emphasizes storytelling on a musical bedrock that creatively blends jazz, folk and blues.Her innovative and expressive style has led the Guardian to call her the Bjork of Euro jazz. She has recorded seven albums for Babel, one of the UK 's most dynamic and creative indie labels. Her music has been described as authentic, streetwise, radical and romantic. John L. Walters of the Guardian says she possesses a "24-carat voice" and Jazzwise hail her as "probably the most adventurous jazz singer of her generation in this country, with the ideas and willingness to push back the boundaries and explore new territory with each new album."
Christine works regularly on the UK jazz scene, appearing at Ronnie Scott's, Vortex, Pizza Express Soho Jazz Club, Jazz Cafe and many reputed international festivals. Her earlier work includes stints in Django Bates' Delightful Precipice, Tim Garland's Lammas, and she has worked in bands with Julian Arguelles, Billy Hart, Kenny Wheeler, Joe Locke, Clark Tracey, Gary Husband and Billy Childs amongst many others.
Her back catalogue is infused with the rich, dark layers of her probingly intense original songs, as well as her unique, sharp-edged interpretive powers on a diverse field of standards from Leonard Cohen through to Cole Porter. Christine's debut album on Babel ; Aililiu was released in 1995; Yell Of The Gazelle in 1996; House Of Women in 1998 and Deep Song in April 2000. The first three albums focused on Tobin's original material while the fourth, which was recorded in New York , is a tribute to the great American song tradition and concentrates on interpretation and creative arrangements. It also features the legendary American drummer Billy Hart, Austrian double bassist Peter Herbert, guitarist Phil Robson and the highly acclaimed U.S. saxophonist Mark Turner. You Draw The Line , recorded in 2003, saw a return to a majority of originals as well as imaginative covers of Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen; it was no. 4 in The Guardian's 101 things to do, buy and see at Xmas'.
2004 saw Christine nominated for Best Vocalist at the BBC Jazz Awards, and her vivid interpretations of Bessie Smith were featured in film director Mike Figgis' Red White and Blues documentary in the Martin Scorsese Presents The Blues series. Christine's sixth critically acclaimed album Christine Tobin's Romance & Revolution - was released in December 2004 and consists of seven of Christine's lyrically incisive trademark originals, including settings of poems by poets Paul Muldoon and Eva Salzman, as well as her own expressively unsentimental arrangements of material by Bob Dylan, Brian Wilson, John Martyn and Bessie Smith.
In June 2008 Christine released her seventh album for Babel "Secret Life Of A Girl". This featured her new seven-piece band with some of the UK 's most exciting and skillful musicians: Kate Shortt (cello), Liam Noble (piano), Phil Robson (guitar), Dave Whitford (double bass), Thebe Lipere (percussion) and Simon Lea (drums).
Secret Life Of A Girl received rave reviews. Here's what The Guardian said: "Dublin born singer Christine Tobin is a jewel of the London jazz scene, streets ahead of the pack, but she deserves better. She should be on a global stage, rubbing shoulders with fellow troubadours like Cave, Mitchell and Cohen. .it's a tribute to the quality of Tobin's writing that there are no weak spots in this excellent collection".
Christine has also sung with the BBC Big Band and internationally renowned arranger Mike Gibbs was especially commissioned to write new arrangements for her two concerts that were broadcast on BBC Radio 2. Mike, who has written for Joni Mitchell, Gary Burton, John Scofield and Carla Bley, to name but a few, also conducted the music. In the US Christine has performed at Joe's Pub the 55 Bar and at the internationally renowned Monterey Jazz Festival. Other international appearances include Haarlem Jazz Fest. Holland, Kongsberg Jazz Fest Norway, Shanghai Jazz Festival China, Berlin Jazz Festival, Varna Bulgaria, Kalisz Poland, Barbican Concert Hall London Jazz Festival amongst many others. She has acted and sung in Ed Gaughan's "Radioplay" which ran for three weeks at the Lyric theatre, Hammersmith London in October 2008.
Christine is a frequent guest on Alyn Shipton's celebrated BBC Radio 3 programme Jazz Library where she has talked about the music and artistry of Billie Holiday, Bessie Smith, Abbey Lincoln and Betty Carter.
Christine is currently writing songs for her new album which will be released in 2010
LIVE REVIEW VORTEX GIG by CHRIS PARKER
Christine Tobin
Saturday 24 January 2009
Two Leonard Cohen songs ('Everybody Knows', 'The Story of Isaac'), three Brazilian pieces, nine originals and a Gershwin encore ('Embraceable You'): another perfectly balanced performance from Christine Tobin.
Her band, too, is faultlessly deployed, cellist Kate Shortt bringing elegant sonorousness to everything she plays, pianist Liam Noble producing a series of adventurous yet cogent solos, guitarist Phil Robson all raunchy bluesiness one minute ('Bye Bye') and tasteful power ('Corner of an Eye') the next, the rhythm section (bassist Dave Whitford, drummer Simon Lea, percussionist Thebe Lipere) vigorously propulsive and subtly restrained as required.
Tobin's material was taken in the main from her latest album, Secret Life of a Girl, but also dipped into previous recordings (Eva Salzman's poem 'Muse of Blues' from Christine Tobin's Romance and Revolution, 'Story of Isaac' from 1998's House of Women); whatever she sang, though, the celebrated voice, a uniquely affecting mix of piercing sweetness and exquisitely controlled vibrancy, utterly entranced a packed club.
Another memorable performance from both vocalist and band; few singers are able to address such a variety of song genres with such assurance, and fewer still are capable of writing enduring originals – Christine Tobin makes both of these feats look easy, and richly deserved the spontaneous and clearly heartfelt ovation that preceded her swooningly lovely encore.
