Steph and I are not into live music concerts. It’s never been our thing, but . . .
. . . when visiting our elder daughter Hannah in St Paul, Minnesota in June 2003, she had three tickets to see Fleetwood Mac at the Xcel Energy Center in downtown St Paul. And just after we returned to the UK in May 2010, we enjoyed a concert by Mark Knopfler at bp pulse LIVE (formerly the LG Arena) in Birmingham.
Before those two concerts it must have been almost 30+ years since I’d attended any live concert, while I was still at university.
So what changed the habit of a lifetime? Last night (4 February) we enjoyed a concert at The Glasshouse International Centre for Music (formerly Sage Gateshead) on Gateshead quayside beside the River Tyne—right across the river from Newcastle city center. It was our first visit there.
The Glasshouse International Centre for Music on the south bank of the River Tune, taken from the Gateshead Millennium Bridge.
View west along the River Tyne from Baltic (a contemporary art center), with the Glasshouse International Centre for Music on the left, and the Millennium and Tyne Bridges (and others) connecting Gateshead with Newcastle on the right.
And the concert? Click on the banner below to open.
Just the one night in Gateshead, from a tour of eight venues between 31 January and 9 February. Tickets at just £39.40.
So why Transatlantic Sessions? We have been fans of this joyous fusion of Scottish, Irish, and American music since we first watched the various series on BBC4. Series 1 was broadcast in 1995, with subsequent series in 1998, 2007, 2009, 2011 and 2013, each comprising six programs. Here are the details of the programs and the many artists who have appeared over the years. This is what is written on the Sessions website:
. . . 2025 mark[s] 30 years since the original TV series first aired and continuing to explore and celebrate the rich musical traditions that connect Scotland, Ireland and the US. An annual focal point of Celtic Connections, the exclusive line-up combines guest singers and the celebrated house band, inviting them to interweave original material with age-old tunes and songs as they explore shared roots and find new common ground.
Here is just a sample of what you can enjoy. The complete series can also be viewed on YouTube, and listened to on Spotify (which I’m doing right now as I write this!). I came across Iris de Ment, who appeared on the first series, when viewing those videos.
Coordinated by musical co-directors Aly Bain MBE, a renowned fiddler from Shetland, and Jerry Douglas, a virtuoso dobro (resonator guitar) player from Ohio and a member of Alison Krauss and Union Station, the house band for 2025 had an impressive line-up, several regulars from the TV series, and some new faces as well.
Jerry Douglas (left) and Aly Bain (right).
The Transatlantic Sessions house band. L-R: Donald Shaw, Aly Bain, Daniel Kimbro, Phil Cunningham, Jerry Douglas, Allison de Groot, Michael McGoldrick, Tatiana Hargreaves, John Doyle, John McCusker, and James Mackintosh.
Old timers were John McCusker (fiddle), Michael McGoldrick (whistle, Irish flute, and uilleann or Irish pipes), Donald Shaw (piano, harmonium, and accordion), and James Mackintosh (drums). Phil Cunningham (accordion) was unable to participate last night due to some family issues.
Newcomers for 2025 were Allison de Groot (banjo) from Canada, Tatiana Hargreaves (fiddle) and Daniel Kimbro (electric and upright bass) from the USA, and John Doyle (guitar) from Ireland (who has appeared from time to time over the years). Daniel and John also performed solo self-penned songs.
Last night’s concert was a mix of house band sets interspersed by individual ones from the guest artists, who were for 2025:
L-R: Julie Fowlis, Niall McCabe, and Larry Campbell and Teresa Williams.
Singer Julie Fowlis (whistle, bagpipes) was born in North Uist in the Outer Hebrides. In fact, she comes from the village of Hougharry on the west coast (so I was told), which I visited in 1966 and 1967, and returned there with Steph in 2015. In last night’s show, she sang several songs in Gaelic, and joined the house band on the whistle and, at the end of the show, playing the bagpipes.
Here she is singing (and playing the pipes) Hug Air a’ Bhinaid Mhoir (recorded in Glasgow at the start of the 2025 tour just a few nights ago), to great audience acclaim last night.
Irish singer-songwriter Niall McCabe was born on Clare Island off the coast of Co. Mayo in Ireland and sang his own material.
Larry Campbell (electric guitar, mandolin) and Teresa Williams (vocals) are a dynamic duo from the USA, hailing from New York and Tennessee, respectively. Besides performing their own mini-sets, Larry played in the house band, and Teresa provided backing vocals, even in Gaelic when Julie Fowlis was performing. Their gospel song in the second half was a tour de force.
And lastly, the inimitable Loudon Wainwright III, a larger-than-life performer who we first came across in the the late 1980s, when he guested on the 1987 BBC show Carrott Confidential, hosted by Birmingham-born comedian Jasper Carrott.
Here is Loudon singing one of my favorite songs, Harry’s Wall, which was released on his album Therapy in 1989.
Wainwright also appeared in three episodes of M*A*S*H, as singing surgeon Captain Calvin Spalding during 1974-1975. We caught up with those episodes when we were living in the Philippines during the 1990s.
In last night’s concert I particularly enjoyed Wainwright’s version of Harmless (or Hermless) by the late Dundee bard, Michael Marra (a great friend of his). Here’s a link to a version on Spotify that Wainwright has recorded.
The concert lasted almost three hours, with a short intermission. It was originally scheduled for a little longer, but since Phil Cunningham could not appear – who I assume would have had a couple of solo sets – it finished just before 22:30.
It began, as Jerry Douglas explained, with a set of three reels to get the band warmed up, so to speak. As if they needed it. No-one was reading from sheet music. How they keep all those tunes stored away in their minds!
One thing in particular, struck me. How everyone on stage worked together, more than the sum of the parts. If anyone had an ego, that was left at the Stage Door. Impressive.
Unfortunately there was no program, so I can’t provide details of the sets. We thoroughly enjoyed the mix of Scottish and Irish melodies (reels and the like), Appalachian, and gospel music, even contemporary compositions, blended with the backing from the house band. One of the most impressive performances was a song—in Gaelic—by Julie Fowlis, accompanied mostly by Donald Shaw on the harmonium.
The Sage One auditorium (holding >1600) was full. Sold Out! We had great center seats at the back of the auditorium.
The view from Row DD, Level 1.
An acquaintance of Facebook kindly sent me these photos that he took during the concert:
Taking a bow . . .
Two final observations. It was interesting to ponder the demographics of the audience, very few under 50, and probably an average age in their 60s. Lots of grey heads, and (so I thought) a higher proportion of beards than you might see in the general population.
All too soon, 22:30 rolled round, and it was time for the encore. What a great evening, and such a pleasure to see these fine musicians live.
We look forward to Transatlantic Sessions returning to Gateshead in 2026.
A balanced diet . . . 