when women couldn’t sing

Having been having the time of my life on this book tour. I wish I could say it has come from selling books (I fear the days of book shops gigs are numbered)  but also because the time you actually get to do that – to really talk to people  and start a conversation about writing and the book  – is so limited. ( There is a Jackson Brown song that contains the line. “And the only time that seems to short is the time that we get to play” Well, that is how it feels on a book tour. )

But in cities like Portland and Nashville after the gig is finished I’ve been lucky enough to find good music to listen to.  (Thank you Jan for driving me round the edges of Portland!)  And i have been knocked out by the bands, and especially,  given what I have been writing about, the women. There are women out there with fabulous voices, great action on the guitar and such stage presence. And it has made me think deeply about Sacred Hearts and how relatively recently it has been that women have the freedom and the respect to be appreciated and noticed as musicians and public performers

In my convent in Sacred Hearts women sung because they were praising God. But what was clear to me researching the book is that they also sung because they loved music and many of them have fabulous voices. They would never be allowed to perform outside the convent, as at the time I am writing it was simply not a respectable job for a well bred woman.

So, as I sat in those bars in Portland and heard Tama belting out Stormy Monday I just wanted to raise a glass to how far history has  brought us

If you know any women out there who like to sing get them to read Sacred Hearts to find out how the managed to subvert the rules,  and then listen to what they sounded like on the podcasts.  You will not  be disappointed

And if you happen to live near Brighton in England , then come to St Batholomews church on May 3rd and hear the book being dramatised with myself and actresses and a whole choir of women who five hundred years ago, might have been nuns.! It will be something. I can promise you.