Concert review: Ralph McTell - Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

BEST known for his 1974 smash Streets of London, Ralph McTell has been plying his trade for more than four decades now, having first emerged as a key bridging figure between British and US folk and blues in the mid 1960s.

His adopted surname – he was christened Ralph May – pays homage to blues icon Blind Willie McTell. The retrospective mood of his current live set, signalled by his opening cover of Woody Guthrie’s Hard Travellin’ – later followed by Dylan’s Girl From the North Country – struck a sagely considered balance of past and present, with McTell’s own material dividing between back-catalogue favourites and recently penned tributes to other early heroes, including Robert Johnson and the Reverend Gary Davis, from last year’s Somewhere Down the Road album.

McTell’s relaxed, down-to-earth demeanour and evident pleasure in performing made it hard to believe he was once sorely plagued by stage fright, as he interwove personal and professional reminiscences with their corresponding musical narratives, including the dreamily conjured boyhood idyll of Barges and the delicately rueful The Girl on the Jersey Ferry, inspired by a line from Citizen Kane: “It’s funny the things a fella will remember sometimes.”

His voice has matured and deepened to a richly roomy, bass-edged pitch, matched with similarly seasoned fingerstyle guitar work. Having modestly slipped in Streets of London halfway through, he finished off in powerfully moving style with Kiss in the Rain, written about and dedicated to his recently departed friend Bert Jansch.

Rating: ****