You wait for a singer to play somewhere near you and they set a date and of course you get your ticket. The much anticipated day arrives but the weather makes you think twice. It's really bad, though maybe you're a wuss. You decide not to go. And that could have been the end of this story. But then this happened - the singer posts on social media that she's arrived in Glasgow after a ferry journey from Bute and a drive through awful weather - she did write a song titled '(Learning to Sail) In All Weather' after all.
So that profound challenge and an obvious change in the weather saw me depart westwards for the customary getting lost within yards of the venue followed by a chickpea korma with my friend Stewart before the show I was there ready to see Josienne Clarke after years of listening to her music and the occasional interaction on social media.
Alone centre stage Josienne held the audience in the palm of her hand. Despite a new album in the offing there was only one new song, the rest of the set spanned a selection from across her career. And what a a body of work from an artist who writes lines like 'make your peace with failure/a lesson that you learned' and 'you sing and play and make things/for that is all you can do'. These lines come from 'Chicago' a song born of the disaster of turning up in that fabled city to play in an empty venue.
As a self declared miserabilist Josienne Clarke shows she also has a sense of humour with her between song banter and introductions. She frets that her sad songs are doing no good and might be making sad people sadder. That's probably a subject to discuss in a thesis but the evidence tonight would seem to counter that view as it appeared that these sad songs sung so beautifully made us, the audience, happy.
And there is the essence - the answer to the question do we need music, especially sad songs. Thank you Josienne the wait and the journey to hear you was worth it. More sad songs? Yes please.
https://josienneclarke.bandcamp.com/
Chicago Sun Times Melancholy is a Vocation in Itself
