Hats off to Kate

Folk singer Kate Rusby is wowing music lovers with her festive tunes

- Jeremy Blackmore

Kate Rusby is an incurable Christmas obsessive. Her love of all things sparkly and seasonal has led her to celebrate this Yuletide with her 12th annual Christmas tour which comes to Norwich this month. She also releases her fifth festive album, called appropriately Holly Head.

It’s one of the warmest Christmas albums you’ll hear, full of joy and good cheer. She begins by imploring: “People awake; salute the happy morn” while the penultimate track proclaims: “I am warmth and I am light / And I am kith and kin / I am Christmas, let me in!” There’s plenty of fun too with Hippo For Christmas asking Santa for a hippopotamus – and why not?

Dubbed the ‘Barnsley Nightingale’, Kate is one of Britain’s best-known folk singers. Her love of Christmas music is steeped in South Yorkshire tradition. There, communities gather in local pubs to sing carols every December. These ‘sings’ are a custom that has been handed down the generations over hundreds of years.

Most of these carols were originally sung across the country in churches. You might recognize the words, but the tunes may not be what you expect. During the Victorian era many of the more uplifting tunes were replaced by more serious, reflective versions, while the originals lived on in the pubs of South Yorkshire.

“It’s just amazing,” says Kate, who still lives in the village where she grew up. “It’s an absolute treasure trove, I love it. There are over 30 different versions of While Shepherds Watched Their Flocks By Night. But most people just know that one which I’ve kind of half forgotten.”

There is a version of While Shepherds Watched sung to the tune of