Feathered folk from You Are Wolf: Quirky composer Kerry Andrew heads to Oxford's Irregular Folk Christmas Party

Birdsong, growling, kitchen percussion and vocal loops… Kerry Andrew may call herself a folk musician, but it’s like nothing we’ve heard before.

But while the chunky jumper-clad, tankard-waving purists may disapprove, the rest of us love it – which is why she has again been nominated for a British Composer of the Year award, alongside Harrison Birtwistle and Master of the Queen’s Music Judith Weir.

“It’s a weird and wonderful take on folk,” says the South Londoner, who performs under the cryptic name You Are Wolf.

“You Are Wolf draws on mostly British folk song and folklore but tries to put a fresh spin on it,” she goes on. “I’m as much influenced by Gavin Bryars and Massive Attack as I am by Sam Lee, the Unthanks and Fairport Convention.

“I’m mostly interested in unusual vocal sounds, theatre and storytelling.”

Next Friday, December 4, she beings her “weird and wonderful” sounds to St Barnabas Church, in Jericho, for the Irregular Folk Christmas Party, hosted by promoter Vez Hoper. Also on the bill are vocal acrobats Ben See and Claire Le Master. Compering is Oxford poet and sharp-wit George Chopping.

For Kerry, the set provides a break from her better-known work as a composer, which has already seen her pocketing three British Composer Awards (for her work Fall in 2010, and then, last year, for her piece Dart’s Love and her community opera Woodwose). Her trophy cabinet also includes a PRS For Music Foundation Women Make Music Award, while between 2010-12 she was Composer in Residence at Handel House Museum.

“I compose mostly,” she says. “But I also perform experimental a cappella with the trio Juice, sing quite out-there jazz, attempt to inspire kids and students in composing wacky and wonderful music. And I write and do a bit of broadcasting, as well as performing as You Are Wolf.”

Juice won an international Independent Music Award in 2012 for their debut album Songspin. Her debut as You Are Wolf, Hawk to the Hunting Gone, came out last year.

So what can we expect? “I have recently been performing with cellist and bassist Sam Hall and percussionist Peter Ashwell, so the arrangements are a bit more rich,” she says. “I promise some sort of seasonal special tune too. It’s never too early (oh, yes it is)!”

But, for all its alternative leanings, she insists her music is real folk. “The set comprises mostly traditional songs, and no matter what we do to them with loop station, synthesizer, bass guitar and rolling pin, the bare-boned songs and stories are at the heart of it,” she says.

And we can expect a strong avian theme to the show from this self-confessed twitcher “I’m a girl who loves a theme, and for a while mine was British birds and folklore, which formed the subject of my debut album.

“I confess to being a member of the Young Ornithologist’s Club when I was a wee thing. I can spot an avocet at a hundred yards.”

And where does the wolf come in? “Ha! It’s a bit of a cheesy answer,” she laughs.

“My husband’s surname is Furlow, and U R Wolf is an anagram of that. And that’s normally a secret, so you have a big scoop!

“It doesn’t hurt that I like wolves too, though. I read Sarah Hall’s novel The Wolf Border this year and was in love.”

The unusual moniker can, however, trip people up – herself included. “I once managed to introduce myself as ‘Hello, I am I Am Wolf. I mean, I am You Are Wolf. I mean, my name is You Are Wolf.’ “That wasn’t a great start.”

Despite living in a 1930s flat in the capital, her music has a strong naturalistic theme. She says: “Though I’m a city girl, I love being out in the British countryside – chucking myself into rivers to swim and doing lots of walking. I have always loved landscape writing and art.

“I think it just speaks to me of something deep-rooted; something that was there long before us and will be there long after we’re all gone.

The nest is yet to come: Kerry Andrew - aka You Are Wolf

“There’s something in the folk song that I’m drawn to that has the same thing: these stories have bee shaped and altered over centuries, and will go on being shaped and altered.”

Her love of animals extends beyond her music. “I’m off to China early next year with the British Council and will be exploring foxes in European and Chinese culture,” she says. “Foxes, wolves, owls - just keep me away from frogs, snakes and slugs. Ugh!”

So what are her proudest moments as an artist? “Receiving double British Composer Awards in 2014,” she says. “That was an awesome feeling. But also singing at the South by South West festival in Austin, Texas, with Juice. Then there’s the novel I’ve written, which my agent is now touting around. I just got my first rejection, woo hoo! Or maybe swimming in two degree-cold water up on the Isle of Skye.”

One of the most poignant moments of her career was when she was asked to compose a piece for the memorial service to the victims of the London 2005 bombings. She says: “I was commissioned to set a poem by the father of one of the victims, which was performed at the memorial service, with Tony Blair and others, and broadcast by the BBC.

“It was an honour to be involved, but it was a strange feeling too. It’s difficult to feel happy about a big performance like that when it’s for something so appallingly tragic.”

This show takes place, to her delight, in the cavernous surroundings of St Barnabas Church. “I love playing in unusual venues, which often have an amazing acoustic and an individual atmosphere you can’t get in a run-of-the- mill bar,” she says. “Churches can be fabulous for that reverb. I was soundchecking at Union Chapel in Islington once and asked the sound engineer to turn the reverb down a bit, because it was a little excessive. Of course, it was all natural!”

It should suit Kerry’s voice perfectly, given its propensity to go freakishly low. “I have a pretty low singing voice for a girl, which I am very happy about,” she says. “But I am now trying to break my record for early-morning-terrible-cold-Kerry. Next time I’m going for Ring of Fire by Johnny Cash.”

Does she need to smoke 20-a-day to maintain that chesty growl? “Sadly, the freakish low notes are all illness-related,” she says. “I am, probably an infuriatingly dull, clean-living gal!”

Where and when
The Irregular Folk Christmas Party, St Barnabas Church, Jericho, Oxford, on Friday, December 4.
Tickets £9 from wegottickets