Julie Byrne @ CCA, Glasgow, 28 May
Julie Byrne runs her fingertips over her guitar strings before each song. From the closest rows, you can hear the opening few notes ring softly, though meant for her ears. On Follow My Voice, half way through the introductory arpeggio, she cuts herself off. “Sorry. I want it to be right,” she says, though it sounds gorgeous to most. She retunes patiently, takes a breath, and starts again.
It’s clear that Bryne is a perfectionist. Her sparse ballads seem easy-going on a cursory listen, but in the flesh, there’s a subtle intensity. Each word of a melody is deliberate. Each strum is made to be felt. It’s a night and day difference to her support, Jim Ghedi, whose rustic acoustic pieces rely on flare and a feeling that they move wherever the wind takes them. Fittingly, Ghedi is a rambling man. His tunes capture his travels to Welsh bothies, or to the oldest tree in Europe, which sunk its roots in Perthshire.
Despite the sentimental nature of this folk spirit, his skills as a performer lend themselves to the thrill of moment-to-moment playing. His last album was inspired by French guitar writing; his latest tune, just a few weeks old, is indebted to the harp playing of a friend from Scotland. With this ear for place, it’s hard to say where his wandering melodies will take us next. What’s certain is they’ll take him far.
Ghedi is suited comfort in this intimate setting, but his tour mate even more so. Byrne has chosen to play to a seated crowd – another methodical move. Without the informality of a standing set, we are encouraged to listen free of chatter. Byrne uses this silence to her advantage. Most of the set is just her and a guitar, vulnerable words galvanised by an earthy, convincing voice. She pauses in between verses, letting the notes dissolve before she continues. On songs like Sea As It Glides, she’s joined by a bandmate who sits with a Korg synth on his lap that’s used to fill the gaps with swelling ambience. Even in these moments, the sound is delicate enough that you can hear the click of their effect pedals.
Byrne’s voice doesn’t soar above her playing, but submerges itself within it as a quiet murmur, to occasionally devastating effect. On Natural Blue it rises above for the first time. "Been a long time since I, since I've been moved," she whispers. "But when I first saw you, that feeling, it came over me too. Natural blue, natural blue," she sings, stretching the vowels as long as they can go, flitting into an expressive flashes of passion.
When returning for an encore, she asks if the stage lights could be dimmed fully. Cool blue light covers her. “Damn it! I wish I’d asked to do that sooner,” she laughs, slapping her knees. Listening to Byrne’s music is sometimes like adjusting your eyes to the dark. Her whole set also feels like a meditation on how to be comfortable in your own skin, and by the end, following her voice, her audience have already gotten there.