Jackie Oates & Karen Tweed Penzance Folk Club

Review by Julie Travis

THE ADMIRAL BENBOW, an ancient pub full of twists and turns and floors that slope or drop away unexpectedly, is the perfect place to see any live music, never mind one of the country's best young folk talents and around 60 people – a full house – squeezed into a chilly upstairs room to hear this duo.

Jackie Oates has had much exposure as part of the latest so-called folk revival (which means the dinner party classes have realised how good folk music is) and early member of Rachel Unthank and the Winterset and has been touring with accordion player Karen Tweed, a name that was less familiar to me but was no less of a talent, at times drawing gasps of admiration from the audience.

This gig was folk music as it's supposed to be – no need for microphones or amplifiers in such a small venue, just the pure, honest sound of voice, viola and piano accordion. And Jackie Oates has got such a voice. I'd seen her sing before only briefly, as a guest of The Imagined Village, countering Eliza Carthy's earthy vocals with her more gentle style, and had been keen to see more.

Her latest album, Saturnine, joyfully received by critics and fans and featuring Tweed among its guest musicians, got a fair airing and on tonight's evidence sounds quite fantastic. It has a West Country flavour including two very local tunes, The Hills Of Trencrom/Pedn Olva, not in tonight's set but those that were – Fortune Turns The Wheel, Brigg Fair, The Sweet Nightingale and Four Pence A Day – were all beautifully sung and played. Tweed gave us a few solo waltzes and regaled us with bizarre tales of her family and then, as I'd hoped, they played their "only cover of a hit record", The Sugarcubes' Birthday. Oates and brother Jim Moray have changed its original tumbling beat to a tango.

Local musicians took the stage during the interval and were all given a respectful hearing by the audience before Oates and Tweed returned. Don't miss them if they head to your neck of the woods.