Beth Nielsen Chapman Talks 2025 Co-Headline UK Tour With Judie Tzuke And More

Jun 13, 2025 | Interviews

Words by Glenn Sargeant

Feature Image Photo Credit: Supplied By RLN Music

Two of the most revered female songwriters Beth Nielsen Chapman and Judie Tzuke will embark on a co-headline October/November 2025 UK Tour. Beth Nielsen Chapman very kindly chatted to us about the tour and more:

What is your earliest musical memory?

My earliest musical memory (besides being five years old sitting in front of my parents record player completely mesmerized by the soprano singing in the background on Herb Albert’s “The Lonely Bull”) was being allowed to cross the street to Mrs. Churchman’s house and go to a dusty old upright piano in her very cluttered basement of lamps and random gardening equipment. I would plunk around it for an hour just making up little tunes.

You will be embarking on a UK tour with Judie Tzuke for fifteen-dates in Autumn 2025. When did the two of you first meet?

Judie and I first met at a fabulous Chris Difford songwriting retreat held in Somerset in collaboration with the Buddy Holly Foundation. Many songwriters, from veterans to up-and-coming talents, gather for a week to collaborate and that is where Judie and I wrote the song “Safe” together. We have written several more times and it is always a joyous occasion. I love the sound of her voice and the way our voices blend.

Do any of the venues/cities on the UK tour hold any personal significance to you?

Oh, there are so many! I have travelled and toured in the UK since the early 1990s, so I couldn’t possibly narrow it down. I have so enjoyed the UK audiences and how diverse they are culturally, even from one village to the next. I’ve been trying to master all of the variations of the English accent. One of my favourite things about the folks on the other side of the pond is that they have a very reverent connection to the songs and they really know their stuff!

Will you have a band with you for the tour? If so, who will be in the band and what do they play?

We will have an amazing band! Aside from Judie and I, Judie’s daughter Bailey will be coming on tour with us, an amazing musician and singer. We will also have Ruth Trimble who I have toured with extensively since 2010. Ruth plays all the instruments and sings incredible harmonies as well. The harmonies in this show are going to be off the chain!

Both Ruth and Bailey will be featured doing one solo song each in the course of the evening so that we can share their talents with the audience. They are both fantastic songwriters as well. In addition to that, we will have Chaz Thorogood who I have not worked with before, but has played with Judie Tzuke for many years and is a fantastic guitar player and all-round musician.

Given your extensive back catalogue, is it difficult picking a setlist? Do you have a song selection process?

Oh yes, the most difficult part of this whole thing is deciding on which songs! It’s hard enough just dealing with my catalogue, but also Judie Tzuke has a serious catalogue! She and I will be jumping on some Zoom calls and making hard decisions and planning a few surprises. That should be a lot of fun.

Where is your hometown and could you please describe it in five words?

I was born in Texas and travelled all around through my childhood (air force family) but I have lived in Nashville, Tennessee since 1985 – “songwriting capital of the world.”

How do you look after your voice?

I was fortunate to have a great teacher after I first moved to Nashville and my voice went through a lot of difficulty, partly because I think I was just trying so hard to succeed and I went through a period of time where I was pushing unnaturally to make a sound as a singer. I worked with a teacher named Gerald Arthur, who taught me in essence how to stop doing all that crazy stuff to my voice and come from the tone and the spirit of my speaking voice.

I am 68 now and I have never had an easier time singing because I have really learned to use no more energy than I would if I were speaking. I never strain my voice anymore and I really don’t even do any warm-ups. I have gone on to develop a teaching style around this premise which I call “Vocal Presence” and I teach workshops on this. It makes me very happy to help someone fairly quickly drop all the luggage they’re carrying in their head around “how to sing”. I have ways of tricking them into just elongating their speaking voice and voilà! The tone and the ease and the beauty of their voice all improves in a relatively short period of time. So, I don’t “look after” my singing voice any more than I look after my speaking voice, which are the same thing. Basically if I get enough sleep and I eat right and I move my body enough to stay in good physical shape I’m good to go!

Do you have any favoured stage instruments, effects, pedals, microphones etc?

Well, I keep saying I’m gonna take some time off and get a bunch of guitar pedals and some cool sounds and have some fun with that, but life keeps intervening! I do love to pick up a bouzouki or ukulele and throw it in some kind of funny tuning for the novelty and write songs that way.

I swear by a good SM 58 as my basic microphone. I don’t know what it is about that microphone, but I’ve tried a million of the more expensive ones and that one always sounds the best. Nothing beats a wired (not wireless!) SM58.

Upon arriving at soundcheck, I will very often just ask for a little bit of additional gain in the channel and those microphones just sound great pretty close to flat in most places.

You are given the opportunity to write the score for a film adaptation of a novel that you enjoy. Which novel is it and why?

“Remarkably Bright Creatures” by Shelby Van Pelt. I loved this book. It is told through the voice of an octopus that lives in an aquarium and escapes and has a whole amazing level of intellect. I was very drawn to this and I think I could do some good octopus scoring ha ha ha.

What two pieces of advice do you have for a novice songwriter?

Go 100 years back and find the top 10 songs of each decade and pick one from each decade and learn it completely where you can play it and sing it if possible. Study the song of each decade that you choose and notice what’s similar or different, even though they are from different times in culture, etc.

Then pick your favourite iconic song that everybody would know and print it out four times. Leave a space where you take out the second verse in each copy of the song. Then refill that song with four new second verses. Creative flow loves a void so it is important that you leave a space on the typed page that you will fill in.

This exercise literally grows new pathways in the brain to reach beyond what’s obvious or what’s already there to keep opening doors until you have just the most incredible song because you have vetted every possible expanse of greatness. And this exercise, as outrageous as it seems — to rewrite an already great song — pushes us past the comfort zone… And then to have to do it four times is the kicker.

What makes Beth Nielsen Chapman happy and what makes you unhappy?

What makes me happy is when my children and my family are all well and safe. It is such an incredibly difficult time to be in the world. Imagining how much suffering so many people are going through who just want this one same simple thing. Steering into the thought of that suffering makes me very unhappy. So, I have to just try to steer the boat back to being grateful and trying to do what I can in my little corner of the world to help or provide something of value on the side of love and kindness.

Feature Image Photo Credit: Supplied By RLN Music

Beth Nielsen Chapman & Judie Tzuke, have announced that they are to join forces for a new 15-date autumn 2025 UK tour.

Full list of UK live dates is as follows:

18 October Bury St Edmunds – The Apex

19 October Bristol St George’s

21 October Buxton Opera House

22 October Shrewsbury Theatre Severn

23 October London Cadogan Hall

25 October Canterbury Gulbenkian Arts Centre

29 October Derby Cathedral

30 October Milton Keynes – The Stables

31 October Basingstoke – The Haymarket