Katherine Jenkins’ Guiding Light

Britain’s best-selling classical artist of the last 25 years, Katherine Jenkins OBE, has just released her new album Guiding Light via Decca Records. The release is also accompanied by the announcement of Jenkins’ 2019 tour, An Evening With Katherine Jenkins.

Guiding Light includes 15 brand-new tracks featuring Katherine Jenkins’ personal favourites – new and old. From the time-honoured ‘Make Me a Channel of Your Peace’ and ‘Morning Has Broken’ to covers of Stormzy’s ‘Blinded By Your Grace’, and ‘Never Enough’ fromThe Greatest Showman, alongside original material including‘Xander’s Song’, written for the newest addition to her family,her son, who was born earlier this year.

‘My voice has changed. This album is the most intimate album I have ever made. It’s a mindful collection of songs. I’m not trying to prove anything, I’m not trying to show how many notes I can hit, I just want to take people to a place of emotion and reflection – to touch hearts and souls.’

As one of the UK’s greatest musical exports, multi-awardwinningJenkins has performed all over the world, for the pope,for presidents and is a favourite of the Royal Family, having been invited to sing ‘God Save The Queen’ at Her Majesty’sDiamond Jubilee, to perform at Her Majesty’s CoronationConcerts at Buckingham Palace and more recently, by special request at Her Majesty’s 90th birthday celebrations at WindsorCastle. She was appointed an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE) at the 2014 New Year’sHonours List for her services to music and charity.

Jenkins has performed twice in South Africa to her huge fan base thanks to Rand Merchant Bank and their StarlightClassics concerts. She has embarked upon numerous sold-out tours and duetted with greats like Plácido Domingo, Andrea Bocelli, José Carreras, Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Bryn Terfel, Rolando Villazón, and Il Divo, among others.

For Katherine Jenkins, Guiding Light represents a deeply emotional journey that began when her beloved father, Selwyn, died, culminating in her new-found path as a mother.

Guiding Light is an album that speaks of life, hope, acceptance and a universal spirituality. For the 38-year-old, there is also a sense of a greater purpose to her performance. ‘I have undergone a huge change in my life,’ says Neath-born Jenkins. ‘As a child, I first started to sing in St David’s choir, so hymns were the songs I grew up with. I loved the music, but the words and the emotion only truly hit me after my father died when I was 15.

‘His death was incredibly difficult for me and my mum and sister but a lot of what I did after that was driven by that sense of loss and the deepest emotion in my music came from that place.’

At 17, after winning several choral awards and competitions, she received a scholarship to the Royal Academy Of Music, where she graduated with honours. At the age of 23, she became the only classical singer in history to be offered a six-album deal by Universal and Decca Records. Her debut, Premiere, was merely the first of twelve best-selling number one albums, followed by two Classical Brit Awards and the record for the fastest-selling British classical artist.

By 2010, so phenomenal was her success that she spent every day of that year on a plane flying from one country to the next, in addition to helping to highlight the plight of soldiers on the frontline and travelling to dangerous war zones to perform for the troops.

Images: Katherine Jenkins © David Venni

‘It’s only now that I’m a mother that I understand how terrified my mother was for me when I called her from Iraq to tell her that the plane I was in had been shot at but that I was okay. My mother was in pieces. I think about it now and can’t imagine how I would feel. All I felt – and still feel – is that I want to perform for the troops because they are out there risking their lives for us every day. I think I should have just waited till I got home to tell her but these are the things you learn,’ she says.

Marriage and motherhood – and even working as the host of the BBC’s Songs of Praise – have had the most fundamental effect on Jenkins. In 2014, she married artist and film director Andrew Levitas, with whom she has two children, 3-year-old Aaliyah and 3-month-old Xander.

‘I have a life now that I don’t think I ever expected to have,’ she says. ‘I am very happy, very blessed and I feel incredibly grateful. I feel whole new layers of emotion which have really taken me by surprise and made me feel like I have found myself, found my true voice and my true self.

‘There is not a minute of the day – even when I’m exhausted or run off my feet trying to juggle everything – that I don’t feel incredibly thankful for what I have and so conscious of how precious it is.

‘And, of course, it’s not all wonderful,’ she laughs. ‘I definitely have those moments where I’m trying to keep all the plates spinning and feel I’m just not managing. The other day when I was going to the studio, I was sorting out Aaliyah who wasn’t feeling well. I was running late and trying to rush and as I picked Xander up to kiss him goodbye he projectile vomited all over me. That’s just what happens these days. I guess nothing keeps it more real.’

Last year, Jenkins, who has performed at scores of glittering celebrity events, became friends with a Cistercian monk, Brother David, whom she met through Songs of Praise. ‘He’s an incredible man who really made me think,’ she says. ‘He had some incredible job working in finance and then just decided he needed something deeper and more meaningful and became a monk. I loved listening to him and what he said really resonated with me. We are now pen pals.

‘Working on Songs of Praise and travelling through Britain talking to remarkable people like Brother David and others who are focused on a more spiritual life was another big factor in this project.

‘I wanted to make an album that was spiritual but not specifically religious and I wanted to include songs that felt very special to me, that triggered those emotions, from “Blinded By Your Grace” to “Jealous of the Angels”, which isn’t a hugely known song but it was written by a woman called Jenn Bostic after her father died and it is very beautiful. “Never Enough” is the song I sing to my daughter every night and “Xander’s Song”, I actually wrote as I breastfed my son. Before I had children, I felt I would give up working when they came along, but now music has become even more precious to me and with songs like these I am very conscious that I am making memories for my children which will be there after I am gone.’

Asked if people will find it unusual that she has chosen one of English rapper Stormzy’s tracks to be part of this album, she laughs: ‘I know Stormzy himself is religious, so it will be interesting to see what he thinks about a different take on his song. I’ve always made my albums with the listener in mind and I really hope this album helps transport people to a calm, serene and reflective place.’