Freya Ridings – Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham – 24th September 2026
RIDINGS MEMORIES
I’ve seen Freya Ridings a few times before, firstly in 2018 supporting Ray Lamontagne in Sheffield, early in her career, just after she released her eponymously titled debut album. Ridings sat alone in front of a large audience, at a piano and played and sang beautifully, but there was a sense that she was just beginning to learn her craft as a live performer.
The second time was in 2023 at Rock City in Nottingham, just after she released Blood Orange. She headlined the show and was joined by a entourage of all male musicians making up a large band. She was dressed beautifully and it was very clear who was the star of the show. She played guitar as well as piano that night switching effortlessly between her instruments.
More recently, in summer 2025 I saw Ridings at Lincoln Castle and she was debuting several songs from Mother Of Pearl. I feel that this songs didn’t land with the audience quite as she might have hoped. Perhaps as she was the support act to the Sugababes that night it wasn’t quite the right audience for her, and as a result she seemed slightly more introverted on that occasion.
BACK IN SUPERSTAR MODE
Tonight she’s back in superstar mode commanding the stage and looking and sounding like she’s in total control again. Sitting centre stage, one again alone, at her piano. It feels like she’s come full circle and that this is how she is happiest and most comfortable performing.
The setlist is particularly interesting because this is very much a Mother Of Pearl tour. Nine of the album’s eleven tracks make up tonight’s setlist with Battleship and Wicker Woman the only omissions. The setlist has been clearly constructed to open and close with her most well known and well loved hits but with a large section of new music at the centre.
Weekends opens the show, an upbeat song with a melancholy undercurrent, before Face in the Crowd provides an early emotional punch. Then comes a substantial run of new material – Euphoria, I Have Always Loved You and Undefeated, before she is joined on stage for Dancing in the Kitchen, R U OK? and Wild Horse, by Ewan Phillips on guitar… who she completely neglects to tell the audience is her husband… but maybe that’s just another reminder to its all that she is the star. Ridings completes the run of songs with Mother of Pearl, If This Is a Dream and Strength in Me.
FRIVOLOUS…OR DEEP?
To pick out one song to highlight, Dancing in the Kitchen initially sounds frivolous, but is actually deeper, more meaningful and more personal than it at first appears… Ridings picks up a ukulele and sings about her family encouraging her to become a singer and about the freedom of nocturnal dancing in the kitchen coupled with a sense of being carefree. She speaks of crying and not caring if the neighbours hear her.
There are similarities to Corinne Bailey Rae’s Put Your Records On, another song about letting go, being yourself and escaping into music. In the way that Rae’s song celebrates her relationship with her grandmother, Dancing In The Kitchen is rooted in her own family and her journey to success as a singer-songwriter. Which I feel I’ve witnessed over the past decade. And in fact Ridings thanks those in the audience that have been with her on her journey since she began.
Ridings has a wonderful, emotionally rich voice, from quieter vocals on certain tracks to huge, soaring choruses on others, from vocals that express genuine aching and emotional vulnerability to powerful, big, bombastic vocals, she’s got range.
BEHIND THE MUSIC
In a live setting Ridings gets to express her songs not just vocally but also physically, as well as responding to the audience and telling us the stories behind the music, explaining what inspired particular songs and what they mean to her.
As the show nears its end Blackout, Waking Up and Ultraviolet move away from the new material and give the audience a more familiar conclusion to the evening as Ridings’ returns to her earlier work. And the final two tracks… very different love songs… provide an almost perfectly constructed contrast. Lost Without You is reflective, intimate and emotional while Castles is an altogether bigger, sharper and more bombastic full-tilt pop song that allows Ridings to conclude her show at maximum volume.
Freya Ridings: Website