Hannah Brine: Live at Rough Trade, Denmark Street

I headed right back to Tin Pan Alley - London’s Denmark Street - for a delightful Sunday afternoon of music with singer songwriter Hannah Brine.

Hannah’s debut album Blue Sky Now features ten songs written by the singer herself, either solo or in collaboration with some songwriting heavyweights, namely Jeff Franzel, Michael Garvin, Henk Pool and Emily Phillips. Produced by guitarist and bandleader Jamie McCredie, it is a genuinely beautiful collection of tracks that allows Hannah’s voice to shine - it’s more often forming part of choirs and a huge range of vocal ensembles in high-profile TV, live and recording projects. Hannah is used to directing groups of voices and it’s really lovely to hear her solo voice in her own compositions.

Today’s gig at Rough Trade on Denmark Street was even more engaging, with just the singer, McCredie’s guitar and backing vocals from Imogen Halsey and Celia Crwys-Finnigan. The album itself includes an impressive selection of the UK’s best musicians: Hamish Balfour and Jamie Safir (piano), Ian King (bass) and Chris Draper (drums) with Freddie Gavita (trumpet) and a string section of Debs White, Dave Larkin (violins), Reiad Chibah (viola) and Julia Graham (cello).

This fine collection of musicians provide an excellent foil to Hannah’s voice, but the pared-down version today was perfect for a hot summer’s afternoon in central London before they all headed off to north London for a full band gig.

A selection of tracks from the album included You Make Me Believe in Love and Heat of the Moment and an encore of This Little Ship, one of the songs with lyrics co-written with Michael Garvin. This latter piece - with just Hannah’s voice and Jamie’s guitar - has become my ear-worm, and long may that fond farewell at the end of a relationship stay in my head.

It’s always good to hear music in a historic location like Tin Pan Alley (which technically doesn’t exist any more, but will always remain for me the real name of Denmark Street) and this gig was in its rightful place at the location so famous for its songwriting.

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