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| Jackie Leven concert Long Gallery Abbot House Dunfermline Thursday 25th February. 8:00pm (doors open 7:00pm). Tickets £12. Available from Abbot House 01383 733266 and Third Base Records 01383 722554. |
Jackie Leven is a songwriter/folk singer who made his first forays into the music business in the late 1960’s. Born in 1950 into a Romany family, Jackie spent his childhood and teenage years in the insular world that was Fife, Scotland at that time. Although Scottish himself, neither of his parents were from the area - his father was an Irish Cockney, his mother was from a large Northumberland (Geordie) family, and adapting to existing cultural norms was a hard, if not formidable task for such incomers. This seems to have formed the start of an independence of mind in the young Leven. Outstanding at English and essay writing at school, times spent alone in glens and hills and by rivers still form the basis of his songs' imagery to this day. Things started to change in his early teens. His mother, unusually for the time and the place, was a lover of American black blues music, and although Jackie was used to coming in the door from school to the strains of 'I got the blues in the bottle, but the stopcork in my hand' by Lightnin' Hopkins, it was a source of fascination to school friends whose own homes resonated to the sound of Wooden Heart by Elvis Presley. Soon he was playing in local bands - the first real electric scene at this time in this part of the world, but also playing his own blues songs in local folk clubs, such as the Elbow Room in Kirkcaldy, where he was encouraged by stalwarts of the scene like Archie Fisher and Hamish Imlach, and passing singers like Doris Henderson, with whom he played a few shows as guitarist. In the following years he travelled, but enthusiastic about punk, he formed the band Doll by Doll in 1978. Despite having a unique and powerful live act, this band never broke through to the mainstream. In 1994 his solo career started in earnest with the release of the album The Mystery of Love is Greater than the Mystery of Death, which earned much critical praise. Since then he has been extremely prolific, releasing another 15 official albums, including a joint album with crime writer Ian Rankin ‘Jackie Leven Said’, featuring the keyboards of Michael Cosgrave. For more than 30 years now Jackie Leven has been making passionate, intelligent music. His live shows are a virtuoso mix of fine singing, precise playing, brooding attitude and a gift for telling a tall tale. Jackie Leven is a prolific and much underrated troubadour capable of producing some lovely songs with heartfelt lyrics. Tickets for his performance in the Long Gallery at Abbot House on Thursday 25th February are on sale at Abbot House on 01383 733266 and at Third Base records on 01383 722554. |
