Dan Whitehouse

A one off night in the heart of the Black Country where Dan will sing a selection of locally inspired songs, celebrating local heritage. From the huge glass production lines and cone-shaped furnaces of the past to reflections on bespoke pieces created in more recent times. Dan’s songs celebrate Stourbridge’s ‘last apprentice’, Mary Macarthur and the chain makers of Cradley Heath, the Brierley Hill Giant and Himley’s Crooked House. Dan will be inviting three special guests to the stage. Over the past two years, acclaimed singer-songwriter Dan Whitehouse has been in a transparently reflective mood with three albums all themed around the physical and metaphorical nature of glass. Influenced by keeping in contact with his young son living in Japan, ‘The Glass Age’ explores our screen-fixated society's communication challenges. ‘Voices From The Cones’ commemorates glassmaking history in Stourbridge and ‘Reflections On The Glass Age’ offers mirror images of the first album, the same songs refracted through acoustic reinterpretations, intimately sung and played to distill the sweet melancholia of the material. Songs and stories from these projects have now been gathered together for ‘A Night Of Glass’, a simple but hypnotic live experience in which, variously behind a piano or on guitar, Dan takes audiences deep into the heart of glass in its myriad manifestations, his expressively nuanced crystalline vocals, a hint of Bowie here, a touch of Cohen there, effortlessly mining a wealth of emotions and ideas. This is where the light gets in. Dan Whitehouse: “Gorgeous… intriguing” The Guardian “Giving voice to the heroes of the glass industry” Black Country Bugle “Saving our industrial heritage” BBC Radio Shropshire “Subtle and delicate melodies” The Sunday Times “Celebrates the lives and stories of people from the glassworks…. Bringing them to a new audience” Midlands Today BBC TV “Like the glass the cones produced, a beauty to be treasured.” Mike Davies Folking.com