Joe Stilgoe celebrates his love of theatre with Chichester date

He will be celebrating that album – simply named Theatre – at Chichester Festival Theatre on January 17 at 7.30pm when Joe and his band will perform alongside the BBC Concert Orchestra. Each song has been chosen or written with the aim of transporting the listener straight into “that hushed auditorium, ready to be absolutely steamrollered by the mixture of emotions experienced as the lights go down and the curtain goes up.”

The album turns the spotlight on some of the greatest songwriters past and present: “Theatre was the thing I missed most (during the pandemic). I had done a lot of work in theatres and it was just the gradual realisation that all the music that I do is basically theatrically inspired. I wanted to see if I could make an album of songs that had a real connection with people, not just the aural connection of thinking ‘I heard this song for the first time when I was doing such and such.’ I wanted that physical connection that we have with music, with songs like Cabaret that are so important to people that it actually felt a bit dangerous for me to be touching those kinds of songs!”

Joe recorded the album with the Metropole Orkest in the Netherlands. Or at least, he very nearly did: “We got into the studio last Christmas and we were booked to go to the Netherlands but I got Covid and I didn't go. The conductor and the producer went on their own and I had to be locked in my shed isolating from my family but then we recorded my bits in London and it all worked out. And it was just such a joyous thing, the way they played, their love for the music and they were so thrilled to be doing this, to be drilling deep down into the tracks on the album. The album came out in May last year and we launched it at the Barbican which was my biggest show ever and I loved it. It was quite a journey going from my shed to the Barbican!”

Joe’s shed was where he famously used to broadcast daily during the dark days of lockdown. He's pleased to say that things are pretty much back to normal now. As he says, there is perhaps still a little bit of reluctance from older people to come out but younger people sprang straight back again. It has certainly changed things, though: “For me I will never complain about a gig again. There were times when even though there is such a great thrill about performing, sometimes just the travel and the whole rigmarole of it all will get to you a bit. But now having had such a break from it I just feel so grateful. It's all about the gratitude and just realising that every gig is important. We know how easily everything can be taken away. We know just how paper thin the business is. The pandemic was just the perfect storm and combination of so many different pieces of misfortune coming together and it just stopped people performing and going to the theatre completely. You couldn't have devised a more perfect way of doing that and it has affected us more than other sections of society but I will always be grateful for the chance to perform now.”