Kathryn Williams (born 15 February 1974, Liverpool, England)[1] is an English singer-songwriter who to date has released 14 studio albums, written and arranged for a multitude of artists,[2] and was nominated for the 2000 Mercury Music Prize.[3]
Williams released her first album, Dog Leap Stairs, on her own Caw Records label in 1999 with a budget of £80. The follow-up, Little Black Numbers, garnered a Mercury Prize nomination in 2000, bringing her to the attention of a wider public.[4]
Her second release on the label, Crown Electric, was produced by Neil MacColl. Its lead single "Heart Shaped Stone" featured a video produced and directed by James Serafinowicz and Al Campbell.
In 2013, Williams was commissioned by New Writing North to produce songs in celebration of 50th anniversary of the publication of Sylvia Plath's The Bell Jar. She performed five of the resulting tunes – "When Nothing Meant Less", "Battleships", "The Mind Has Its Own Place", "Tango With Marco", and "Part Of Us" – at the 10th Durham Book Festival. Teaming up with Ed Harcourt as producer, she released Hypoxia on 15 June 2015.[9]
In 2015 Emji, a finalist on the French TV talent show Nouvelle Star, won the 11th series singing "Toboggan (You Are The One)", a song written by Williams, David Saw and John Quarmby, which was her first single.[10]
Williams appeared with Maxïmo Park at BBC 6Music Festival, Sage, Gateshead on 21 February 2015.
Her 14th album, a collaboration with author Laura Barnett featuring songs based on Barnett's second novel, Songs From The Novel 'Greatest Hits', was released on 16 June 2017[12]
A multi CD box set of Kathryn's solo work from 1998 to 2015 encompassing 10 previously released albums with 10 further CDs of bonus material was released on One Little Indian 30 August 2019.[13]
The Crayonettes
Williams collaborated with friend / former member of punk band Delicate Vomit, Anna Spencer, on a new project entitled The Crayonettes. Williams and Spencer, both tired of the same old children's CD format, decided to make their own record using their own children as an in house focus group. They released the album Playing Out: Songs For Children & Robots from One Little Indian (6 September 2010). The Guardian wrote that "Pirates On the Bus" "sounds like the Moomins playing The Slits."[14]
The Pond
The Pond consisted of Williams alongside Simon Edwards, formerly of Fairground Attraction and fellow singer/songwriter Ginny Clee, releasing their self-titled CD in 2012.[15]
BBC.co.uk called it "An elegant, charming and quietly profound record",[16] and MOJO magazine "A whirling magimix of hypnotic, funky loops, vintage beats and sensuous harmonies".[17]
Songwriting and art
Williams has been involved in writing retreats and sessions that enable songwriters to share, collaborate and produce ideas as well as learn new skills and techniques. Firstly tutoring at such events alongside Tom McRae, Samantha Parton and Chris Difford whose own retreats Williams has attended.[18] As a result, Williams has established her own writing residential courses which took place in 2014-16.
Williams was given a New Writing North commission as poet in residence at Alnwick Garden in 2006. An audio CD Words from the Garden was released in 2007 featuring writings from Williams, Nev Clay, Emma McGordon and Anna Woodford set in a soundscape by Caroline Beck, with music by Williams and Clay.[19]
As well as creating artwork for her debut album and Two, her collaboration with Neill MacColl, Williams produced the cover art for David Rotheray's Life Of Birds album.[20] and Mardous' "Revolution Over The Phone" single.[21]
Williams collaborated with The Guardian writer Tim Dowling, Chris Difford and Ed Harcourt on a 2014 Christmas single "Snowfall" in aid of The Guardian's Christmas charity appeal.[22]
She was selected as a judge for the British Poetry Society's Ted Hughes Award for Poetry 2016 in conjunction with poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy.[23].. She also performed specially commissioned material for 'A Poet Laureate's Peterloo' commemorating the 200th anniversary of the Peterloo massacre featuring Carol, Clare Shaw, Mark Pajak, presented by Ian McMillan and broadcast on BBC Radio 4, 11 August 2019 [24]
Martin Dominic Forbes Carthy MBE is an English singer and guitarist who has remained one of the most influential figures in English folk music, inspiring contemporaries such as Bob Dylan and Paul Simon, and later artists such as Richard Thompson, since he emerged as a young musician in the early days of the folk revival in the UK during the 1960s and 1970s.
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Christopher Henry Difford is an English musician. He is a founding member and songwriter of the rock group Squeeze.
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Mark "Boo" Hewerdine is an English singer-songwriter and record producer. His work includes lead singer and creative force behind The Bible, formed in the 1980s, and reformed in 1994, as well as solo recordings and work for film. He has also produced records by several artists, including a long association with Eddi Reader. He has been described as "one of Britain's most consistently accomplished songwriters".
Norma Christine Waterson was an English singer and songwriter, best known as one of the original members of The Watersons, a celebrated English traditional folk group. Other members of the group included her brother Mike Waterson and sister Lal Waterson, a cousin John Harrison and, in later incarnations of the group, her husband Martin Carthy.
Anne Patricia Briggs is an English folk singer. Although she travelled widely in the 1960s and early 1970s, appearing at folk clubs and venues in Britain and Ireland, she never aspired to commercial success or to achieve widespread public acknowledgment of her music. However, she was an influential figure in the British folk revival, being a source of songs and musical inspiration for others such as A. L. Lloyd, Bert Jansch, Jimmy Page, The Watersons, June Tabor, Sandy Denny, Richard Thompson, and Maddy Prior.
The Bible are an English band. The band released two critically acclaimed albums in the mid-1980s and are best known for the independent chart hits "Graceland" and "Mahalia". Since The Bible's first split in 1990, lead singer Boo Hewerdine has maintained a solo career while the band itself has been intermittently active.
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Candyfloss and Medicine is the third studio album by Eddi Reader released in the UK on 8 July 1996, which peaked #24 in the UK charts.
Jim Causley is an English folk singer, songwriter, and musician from Devon who specializes in the traditional songs and music of the West Country. Journalist Colin Irwin has called him "the finest singer of his generation".
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Kathryn Williams 2016
