Peter Viney's Blog

Eliza Carthy & Jon Boden
Wassail Tour November & December 2025

Winchester Theatre Royal
Wednesday 12th November 2025

Eliza Carthy – vocal, viola, violin, accordion
Jon Boden – vocal, concertina, violin, guitar

SET LIST

Ashen Bowl
The Holly & The Ivy
Beautiful Star
Remember Thou, O Man
Jungle Bells
Diadem
King of The Birds
Winter Grace
INTERVAL
Mount Zion (While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks)
The Good Doctor
In The Bleak Midwinter
Recumbent Posture
Shepherds Arise
I Saw Three Ships A-Sailing
I Want A Hippopotamus for Christmas
Glad Christmas Comes
ENCORE
A Fairy Tale of New York

Winchester is the first full date on the tour, after a warm up in Buxton. I love reviewing stuff you can see. The tour dates are at the end. Eighteen venues country-wide. You can get to see it. Do.

Eliza Carthy and Jon Boden are in folk terms, a Supergroup, or rather, Superduo. As the poster says, nineteen folk awards between them. They have history- Jon Boden started out in her backing band, The Ratcatchers, before going on to Spiers & Boden, Bellowhead and Jon Boden & The Remnant Kings. There are several musicians with famous singing parents, but not that many with two. Eliza is the daughter of Martin Carthy and Norma Waterson.

They have a wonderfully relaxed charisma. They look happy on stage, with plenty of banter between them. Folk concerts benefit from introductions and explanations of song history, and jokes, and they make the average rock performers look distant and self-obsessed. Audiences like to get the sense of personality as here. They like to see the artists themselves selling the merchandise, chatting, signing CDs and LPs. Winchester is also where Jon Boden grew up, which gave added stuff to chat about. He pointed out that the Theatre Royal was closed in his youth. It’s a very pleasant venue. This was the most people we’ve seen there though.

Both are multi-instrumentalists. Jon Boden played concertina more than I’d expected. Eliza Carthy used accordion for two songs with lots of comments. Quite often Eliza sang without playing, and Jon played concertina. I don’t want to reveal any of the introduction humour, but I will note some song origins. Their great point is that both are distinctive, instantly recognisable ‘signature voice’ performers. Not only that, they can still blend together.

Ashen Bowl was unfamiliar and it also opens the album. They set out to play the whole album and do, but there are additions and it’s not in the same order. This was Jon on concertina and lead vocal and Eliza on viola and harmony. BTW, I may well get violin and viola mixed up, but there was one of each. Maybe ‘fiddle’ gets me off the hook.

The Holly & The Ivy was an excellent second choice as one we’d all know. Both were playing fiddle with great interchanges.

Beautiful Star had Jon on concertina and Eliza simply singing the main vocal line. They credited it to the popular version by The Stanley Brothers and mostly it’s called Beautiful Star of Bethlehem in other versions. It comes from Tennessee (probably) and is beloved of bluegrass groups. This is however this by Eliza Carthy is the best I’ve heard. She has multiple backing singers on the CD (which I’m playing as I write this) but Jon did brilliantly on his own. My favourite song of the evening, and also the ear worm I woke up with.

Remember Thou O Man was another with both vocals, and just concertina. This dates to Thomas Ravenscroft in 1611. Jon explained that, and I’m reading the CD notes.

Jingle Bells, concertina and viola. Wonderful. Possibly the most recorded Christmas song ever. They did the whole thing with lyrics, most of which are completely new to me. I thought they’d made them up, but no, it dates to James Pierpont in 1822. It is American. I checked the modern lyric which is a pale shadow of the original words they sang. First published in 1857 as One Horse Open Sleigh.

Wikipedia adds that it was the first recorded Christmas song too, on an Edison cylinder in 1889. That’s lost, but an 1899 copy survives. Wiki has the lyrics. Jon Boden has tweaked and improved them.

Diadem is not from the album. They explained that it was a “my side’s better than your side” song for duelling choirs and we got on with it. We were on Jon’s side of the hall. What would Christmas be without a touch of audience singalong in two teams?

King of The Birds is an Eliza Carthy original. Jon Boden played violin and Eliza Carthy picked up the accordion which led to much banter. I won’t spoil it. It’s a jaunty tune.

Winter Grace is By Jean Ritchie from Kentucky. I had to check online. She was known as the Mother of Folk at US festivals and was born in Viper, a town whose name you wouldn’t forget. There are a number of those in America. The first half is just the two voices on a shared mic, then they added guitar and viola for an instrumental reprise, with fiddle taking the melody line. A sublime song to end the first half.

INTERVAL

Mount Zion (While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks) was Eliza singing to Jon’s concertina and vocal. They explained that it’s one of several tunes that fit the carol. (I know several lyrics too!) We all know the words. We’ve been to school nativities and heard it. I remember my grandson being promoted from cloud to sheep in his second year, and falling asleep during it. Familiarity with words gets you past the different tune.

The Good Doctor is a Jon Boden original. It’s taken from bits of Mummers’ songs, and sounds remarkably like a stripped down Bellowhead. That’s a good thing. Additional brass and chorus on the CD version removes the ‘stripped down’ from the Bellowhead comparison.

In The Bleak Midwinter. This was strange as the concertina started the audience humming along which continued at the end. This one gets a full brass treatment on the CD version, making me think of the Salvation Army playing in sleet in a shopping mall. No one needs telling how beautiful the melody is, and Eliza performs it definitively. The CD version wins here because of the brass arrangement.

Recumbent Posture. A Marriott Edgar comic monologue read by Eliza while Jon provided gentle ambient concertina. It’s not on the CD. My old co-writer Bernie Hartley could do a good turn on Marriott Edgar monologues and could go well beyond The Lion & Albert. He came from Blackpool. I mentioned his Blackpool accent was turned on strongly when he performed them, and he said it wasn’t Blackpool. It was mills towns Lancashire which is where the punters in Blackpool came from. Anyway, it’s a great piece and a change of pace, and very well read.

Shepherds Arise, a Copper family song with violin and viola intertwined.

Three Ships A-Sailing with guitar from Jon and fiddle from Eliza. I will avoid plot spoiling her intro, though it mentions Hull. I’ve told the tale of being in a compartment train to Hull in the late 60s. The only other occupant had a guitar case and asked if I minded if he practised. I listened transfixed, then asked his name. It was Eliza’s dad, Martin Carthy.

I Want A Hippopotamus for Christmas. Twin squeeze boxes. Eliza on accordion and Jon on concertina. You will know the music hall style tune, but not the words. It was an American hit record in 1953 sung by ten year old Gayla Peevey. Where did Jon Boden find it? It’s not on the usual British Christmas compilations. The brass section finishes it off on the CD. It was even more fun on stage, where we had the two squeeze boxes finishing off. Go and see them. It’s a highpoint in the show, and all I’ll say is I saw Martin Carthy and Billy Bragg do the same routine.

Glad Christmas Comes is the title track of the CD. It was performed as a vocal only duet, using words from John Claire, with a melody by Eliza Carthy and Jon Boden.

ENCORE

Fairytale of New York. This is the one that does get on all those Now That’s What I Call Christmas XXXIV compilations. The Pogues with Kirsty MacColl in 1988, a story song with a male and female singer, so an ideal closer. Back to Wikipedia, which says it’s the most played Christmas song in the UK in the 21st century. Hmm. I wish it were, but everytime I go in a mall it’s Wonderful Christmas Time or Merry Christmas Everyone. Jem Finer and Shane MacGowan are said to have written it after Elvis Costello bet threm they couldn’t write a Christmas song. 3.6 million sales (including compilations and streaming) the UK proved they could.

I list the tour below. It’s a fabulous evening’s entertainment, great singing and music. It will be coming reasonably near most readers. If it’s not, buy the CD or LP.

CD Tracklist:

The Tour:

LINKS TO REVIEWS ON THIS BLOG

Eliza Carthy Band, 2011
Jon Boden & The Remnant Kings, 2017
Bellowhead 2.2013
Bellowhead 7.2013
Bellowhead 2014
Bellowhead 7.2015
Bellowhead 2016
Spiers & Boden 5.13
Spiers & Boden, 6.13
Spiers and Boden 2014