Emily Portman

The Loft, Leeds

21 March 2026

Seven years since I last saw Emily Portman live, and an astonishing eleven since her last album. I've seen her name pop up in a handful of collaborations since, but I really thought I wouldn't ever hear her singing her own songs again. But here we are.

Quick digression to mention the support band Elm. Two women who both sing and both play cellos... you already know I think this was the best thing ever, right? Sadly, they have no merch, and have so far defeated my efforts to find any of their songs available to buy on line ("Elm" is a common band name it seems, and none of those I've found look right).

The Loft is a new venue (this is apparently only the third gig they've put on), and still feels like a bit of a work in progress. But the staff are friendly and enthusiastic, and I'm sure they can iron out any rough edges, and new venues deserve all the support they can get in today's climate.

So, Emily Portman: after seven years what's changed? Her backing band is new (now a guitar and cello, but both musicians also add harmony vocals), and Emily is now playing piano on half the songs (banjo for the other half).

The other change is that the audience is disappointingly small. She's playing to barely 30 people. She used to play to five times that number in Newcastle. Maybe it's just wrong night, wrong venue, wrong city. Maybe it's because of economics, because many artists are struggling to fill venues these days. Or maybe it's that seven years is too long a gap for people to remember her? I hope not, because she's back with a stunning new album that's easily as good as anything she's done in the past. She plays almost all of it tonight (only three older songs, I think), and even stripped of the lush arrangements on the album the songs all sound beautiful when played live.

What quite clearly hasn't changed is the power of her songwriting. Her songs have a strong thread of folklore running through them, and even when she's talking about modern subjects the same imagery and magic runs though them.

Still one of my favourite songwriting, and happily back on my must-see-live list for, I hope, a very long time to come.