Anglo-American singer-songwriter Sarah Gillespie is renowned for mixing elements of folk, jazz, and Americana with her signature poetic lyricism.

Over the past 15 years, Gillespie has released five critically acclaimed albums to widespread praise from the UK press and beyond. She's toured extensively across the UK, Europe, and the US, performing at leading venues and festivals including Blue Note (Milan), Ronnie Scott’s (London), CBGB’s (NYC), the Singer Songwriter Festival (Lahr, Germany), and sold-out shows at the Southbank Centre’s Purcell Room.

A compelling live performer and articulate commentator, Gillespie has appeared on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour (twice), Loose Ends, and Start the Week, where she was invited to speak about the intersection of politics and the arts. (She holds an MA in Philosophy and Politics.) Her work has received airplay on BBC Radio 3, BBC Radio 2, and public radio stations across the United States. Her band features top-tier jazz musicians: Chris Montague (guitar), Tom Cawley (piano), James Maddren (drums), and Conor Chaplin (bass).

In 2020, during the global lockdown, Gillespie founded the Create Now Academy, delivering transformative songwriting and creativity programmes, workshops, and retreats to women around the world.

In addition to her work as a performer and mentor, Gillespie is a producer. Through her label Pastiche Records, she and her team have produced and released several acclaimed albums and EPs internationally. She is also the co-founder of She Writes Songs, a non-profit organisation championing female songwriters.

THE SHIELING

Following a run of intimate duo performances in California + New Mexico, Sarah Gillespie and Chris Montague retreated to a cottage on the shores of Loch Fyne, Scotland, to record their forthcoming duo album, The Shieling. The cottage, belonging to Chris’s parents, takes its name from the Scottish rural tradition of simple shelters used during seasonal grazing in the hills where families would gather, tell stories and make music.

The Shieling draws on Gillespie’s distinctive poetic sensibility and Montague’s maverick musical imagination, his guitars, mandolin, pedal steel and banjo taking the songs into unexpected territory. Rooted in folk, Americana and vivid beat inspired poetry, the first single 18th Holy Curse is released in November 2026 and the album in February 2027 on Pastiche Records.

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