Gwyneth Herbert (born 26 August 1981) is a British singer-songwriter, composer, multi-instrumentalist and record producer. Initially known for her interpretation of jazz and swing standards, she is now established as a writer of original compositions, including musical theatre. She has been described as "an exquisite wordsmith" with "a voice that can effortlessly render any emotion with commanding ease" and her songs as being "impressively crafted and engrossing vignette[s] of life's more difficult moments".
Three of her seven albums have received four-starred reviews in the British national press. Another album, Between Me and the Wardrobe, received a five-starred review in The Observer. She wrote and performed a new song cycle, The Sea Cabinet, for which she was commissioned by Snape Maltings as artist-in-residence and which she subsequently recorded as an album. Theatre Elision gave the song cycle its United States premiere at The Southern Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Early life and education Born in Wimbledon, London, to Mary and Brian Herbert, she was brought up in Surrey and Hampshire in the south of England. She began playing the piano at the age of three and was writing basic songs at the age of five. She also learned the French horn, achieving Grade 8 by the age of 15. Throughout her teenage years she played music with local orchestras and bands such as the Surrey County Youth Orchestra and also briefly formed a short-lived punk band. At 14 she recorded a demo tape of her own songs at Trinity Studios, Woking; however, despite music industry interest, she chose to continue with her studies.
Herbert went to Glebelands School in Cranleigh, Surrey and, for her sixth form studies, to Alton College in Hampshire, where her musical tastes moved more towards jazz. While she was studying at St Chad's College, University of Durham, Gwyneth Herbert attended St Chad's College from 1999 to 2002 and obtained a BA (Hons) in English Literature. she met up with fellow student Will Rutter and together they began to write and perform in the cafés and bars of North East England as a jazz duo called Black Coffee.
Professional career
First Songs After leaving university, Herbert and Rutter moved to London, where they soon met a former member of Boney M who had been asked to judge a forthcoming Polish television music competition. As Black Coffee, they were invited to enter, and won the competition. Returning to London, Black Coffee continued to perform in local bars, before being introduced to Ian Shaw, a noted jazz vocalist. This led eventually to the production of a debut CD, First Songs, initially credited to "Gwyn and Will", of both original songs and jazz standards, which was launched at London's PizzaExpress Jazz Club in September 2003. The Herbert/Rutter song "Sweet Insomnia" featured guest vocals from Jamie Cullum. Described by BBC Music's reviewer as "a lovingly crafted debut", the album received a significant amount of radio airplay on Jazz FM and BBC Radio 2, and was promoted by Michael Parkinson.
Bittersweet and Blue Soon after, Herbert was signed to the Universal Classics and Jazz label and released, in September 2004, her first major label album, Bittersweet and Blue. This comprised mainly jazz standards, but also included three original tracks by Herbert and Rutter. Herbert's version of Neil Young's "Only Love Can Break Your Heart", taken from this album, was featured on the soundtrack of romantic comedy Leap Year, directed by Anand Tucker and starring Amy Adams and Matthew Goode. John Fordham, in a four-starred review of the album for The Guardian, praised Herbert's "precociously powerful chemistry of taste and meticulous care for every sound – from a whisper to an exhortation".
Between Me and the Wardrobe Herbert left Universal Classics and Jazz to pursue a less commercial and more personal musical direction and then self-financed a project in which she collaborated with Polar Bear's Seb Rochford in a production role. Between Me and the Wardrobe, an album of self-penned songs, was recorded in three days and was never intended for general release. The album was initially made available, in 2006, on Herbert's own Monkeywood label before being picked up by Blue Note Records, making Herbert their first UK signing in 30 years. In a five-starred review, Stuart Nicholson of The Observer said that on this album she "lets the lyrics do the work for her. They are well thought out, moving between artfully constructed soft-focus simplicities to poignant yearning".
Ten Lives and All the Ghosts In early 2008, Herbert was commissioned by a collaborative project between Peter Gabriel and Bowers & Wilkins to record an acoustic album at Gabriel's Real World Studios. The result of these sessions, Ten Lives, was released as a digital download in July 2008, available only from the Bowers & Wilkins website as part of their Music Club.
Remixed versions of these songs were to form the basis of Herbert's album All the Ghosts: it was released by Naim Edge in July 2009 in Europe to critical acclaim, including four-starred reviews from The Daily Telegraph and The Guardian; the album was released in the United States in June 2010. This album also featured two further recordings, including a cover version of David Bowie's "Rock 'n' Roll Suicide", by Robert Harder, who had previously collaborated with Herbert as recording engineer of Between Me and the Wardrobe. It was remastered for vinyl by Steve Rooke at Abbey Road Studios, London and reissued in LP format in 2010.
Clangers and Mash In October 2009, Herbert returned to Harder Sound Studio to record the song "Perfect Fit" which she gave away as a free download, available exclusively from Naim Edge. It was also released as a single on 7 March 2011. The track was also one of nine tracks on her EP Clangers and Mash, released on 1 November 2010, which included remixes, by Seb Rochford of Polar Bear, of some of her previously published songs.
In a four-starred review for The Guardian, John Fordham described it as a "fascinating set of variations on the familiar for Herbert regulars, or an appealing introduction for jazz-averse newcomers", saying that although her songs had been radically transformed, "Herbert's unfussy soulfulness and personal vision always glow through".
The Sea Cabinet In January 2010, Herbert was commissioned by Snape Maltings as artist-in-residence to write, record and perform a new body of work based on stories of the sea. This was performed in October 2010 at Snape Maltings. An album of this music, The Sea Cabinet, was released in May 2013 and launched in a series of concerts from 23 to 26 May at Wilton's Music Hall in London's East End. In a review of the album launch, The Guardians jazz critic John Fordham said that "Herbert's imaginative narrative, and her casually commanding voice – whether softly nuanced as confiding speech or at full soaring-contralto stretch – were the central characters in an entertaining and often moving show that opens a new chapter in her creative story". Michal Boncza, in a review for the Morning Star of musical performances in 2013, described it as a "stand-out", admiring "a voice that can effortlessly render any emotion with commanding ease. Every song is an impressively crafted and engrossing vignette of life's more difficult moments and they grab the attention time and again".
The Financial Times four-starred review called it "a concept album about the debt British history owes to the sea". In a four-starred review The Independent described it as a "cabinet of curiosities" with "a cabaret approach to storytelling, in rollicking sea shanties and waltzes", and "inventive" instrumentation "featuring wheezing accordions, warbling woodwind, tinkling music boxes and rolling bells". Alexander Varty, for Vancouver's The Georgia Straight, said that the album "blends Weimar cabaret and English music-hall stylings, with disquieting touches of avant-garde jazz".
Commenting on her live performance in July 2013 at the Love Supreme Jazz Festival in Glynde Place, East Sussex, Nick Hasted of The Independent said: "Gwyneth Herbert sings the shanties on her The Sea Cabinet album with happy, cabaret sensuality, detailing a relationship’s shipwrecked, sunken past in 'I Still Hear The Bells'".
In a performance described as "mesmerising" and "a surreal delight", with "beautiful entrancing music", Theatre Elision gave the song cycle its United States premiere from 30 May to 9 June 2019 at The Southern Theater in Minneapolis, Minnesota. The production, with a running time of 75 minutes, was directed by Lindsay Fitzgerald.
Letters I Haven't Written Letters I Haven't Written, her seventh album, was released on 12 October 2018. It was produced at Rockfield Studios, Monmouth and, like Herbert's previous album The Sea Cabinet, was crowdfunded. The songs on the album, all written by Herbert, have been described as "exquisitely crafted". On the subjects of "love, gratitude and protest", they are about the lost art of letter writing. Reviewing the album for Jazzwise magazine, Peter Quinn said that "Letters I Haven't Written is by turns moving, thrilling and entrancing".
The A–Z of Mrs P In 2010, Herbert won the Stiles and Drewe Song of the Year Award with her composition "Lovely London Town", from a musical she wrote with playwright Diane Samuels. The musical, The A–Z of Mrs P, tells the story of Phyllis Pearsall's creation of the London A–Z Street Atlas. It was performed in workshop with actress Sophie Thompson in May 2011 and opened at Southwark Playhouse on 21 February 2014 starring Peep Show actress Isy Suttie. The show's original cast recording, which includes a bonus track sung by Herbert, was released in March 2014.
Springtime for Henry (and Barbara) At Site Gallery, the contemporary art space in Sheffield, Gwyneth Herbert and the artist Mel Brimfield explored an imagined relationship between the sculptors Henry Moore and Barbara Hepworth in Barbara and Henry – The Musical, which ran from 18 November to 13 December 2014. This developed into the spoof musical Springtime for Henry (and Barbara), which was performed at Wilton's Music Hall in London's East End on 26 and 27 January 2016. It starred Frances Ruffelle as Hepworth and Andrew C. Wadsworth as Moore.
The Snow Queen, A Christmas Carol and The Nutcracker In December 2016 and January 2017 she performed in, and was composer, lyricist and musical director for, a musical production at Bristol Old Vic of Hans Christian Andersen's story The Snow Queen, directed by Lee Lyford. The Guardians reviewer, Lyn Gardner, praised "Gwyneth Herbert’s delightful songs and their deadpan wit".
She returned to Bristol Old Vic in December 2018 as a performer, composer, lyricist and musical director for a musical production of the Charles Dickens story A Christmas Carol, also directed by Lee Lyford, which received a five-starred rating from the Bristol Post. Reviewing the show for WhatsOnStage.com, Daisy Bowie-Sell said: "Gwyneth Herbert's music is a lovely, a-tonal mix of minor chords that are a little reminiscent of those heard in the Old Vic's recent The Grinning Man. And though the songs are not exactly ear worms, they are absolutely beautiful, including a love song sung by Crystal Condie as Scrooge's one-time love interest and Harry Bird as her partner." The Guardian described Herbert's music for the show as "haunting". The production continued its run until 13 January 2019 and returned on 28 November 2019, running until 12 January 2020.
She was composer/lyricist for Bristol Old Vic's 2022 Christmas show The Nutcracker. She also had a part in this production in what The Observers reviewer described as the "terrifying, curse-hurling Queen Mouse, played by Herbert with wicked glee".
Other musicals and compositions