Carole King at BST 2016 review: Tears of joy as Tapestry sweeps Hyde Park

Tapestry lost none of its emotional charge in front of 65,000 people, says John Aizlewood
Emotional reception: Carole King performs Tapestry in full for the first time in Hyde Park
Daniel Leal-Olivas/PA Wire
John Aizlewood4 July 2016

Carole King’s second album, Tapestry, was briefly the best-selling album ever (it’s still in the all-time Top 40) and a US Number 1 for 15 weeks in 1971. It spawned a flotilla of soul-searching women singer-songwriters, from Tori Amos to Adele.

Now 74, King performed Tapestry in full for the first time last night. For all its obvious greatness, it was less obvious such an intimate collection would thrive in a field for an audience of 65,000, including David Morrissey, Michael Ball, Jess Phillips, Mel C, Alan Carr, Kelly Jones, Steve Coogan, Niall Horan and models Lizzy Jagger, Georgia May Jagger and Suki Waterhouse

Marvellously, this soundtrack for a thoughtful generation lost none of its emotional charge in the large setting and I’ve never seen so many people crying with joy at a concert. Tears fell during the mass sing-alongs of You’ve Got A Friend, Way Over Yonder and an almost sacred version of Will You Love Me Tomorrow? where King duetted with her daughter, Louise Goffin. More surprisingly, King swapped her piano for guitar on Smackwater Jack and pulled rock shapes aplenty. Unable to reach the higher, sustained notes, King was relaxed about ageing (“this is what 74 looks like”) but she seemed overwhelmed by the adoration. When she beat her chest and mouthed “oh my God!” after the aching Beautiful, she almost lost her composure.

There was more. Up On The Roof and a magnificently silly, hard-rocking Locomotion acknowledged her pre-Tapestry songwriting career, while a rumbustious appearance from the West End cast of Beautiful: The Carole King Musical on a reprise of Tapestry’s swinging I Feel The Earth Move showed that King’s songs still sound young. An evening to treasure.

Festivals in London this summer

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