Emmylou Harris at the Royal Albert Hall

Emmylou Harris

Jim Lauderdale

Royal Albert Hall, 17 May 2026

It really was bittersweet to see the legendary Emmylou Harris play the Royal Albert Hall as part of her Farewell Tour, before she retires from touring outside of the States. Even though she turns 80 years old next year, she sounded as wonderful as ever tonight, treating us to songs from throughout her career, I just wish it wasn't the last time!

Even though the Royal Albert Hall is a bit awkward to get to (for me), I can't deny that it was nice for once not to have to queue and to have a guaranteed seat and funnily enough I was almost sitting in the same place as I did last year for the Wilco show, right at the side of the stage.

It was interesting to see that Emmylou's band set-up was so much more simple than Wilco's and placed further forward, which did mean this was even more of a side-view than the Wilco show, but I can't complain as fortunately there was no one sitting in the seats directly in front of me so my view was relatively unobscured. 

Because I did have a seat, I did only turn up for the show's start time but fortunately I was in time to see opening act Jim Lauderdale, who stepped on stage looking every bit the country star at 7.30pm on the dot. Lauderdale has, what can only be described, as a mane of long white hair and was wearing a striking Nudie-style blue suit with sparkly white embroidery on the arms and legs.

Armed with just his acoustic guitar, Lauderdale gamely launched into a bluesy, upbeat number called Three Way Conversation. I'm not actually familiar with Lauderdale's music but it sounded fantastic in the huge hall, just one man and his guitar but the sound seemingly reaching the rafters. There was no doubt, this was proper old school country music, and since this show was part of the annual Highways festival, it felt just right.

The next song he told us he wrote with the legendary bluegrass pioneer, Ralph Stanley, with whom he recorded an album with back in 1999. It turned out to be the appropriately titled I Feel Like Singing Today, which had such a jaunty, happy and hopeful feel, I think it had everyone's feet tapping. He then kept with the bluegrass theme with the rootsy Innocent Heart, which sounded right out of O Brother, Where Art Thou?

Lauderdale it turns out has written songs for some pretty big names in country and collaborated with some true legends too. Every second song he seemed to be telling us, "here's one I did with Buddy Miller" (I Lost You and Wild Goose Chase) or "here's one I wrote with Elvis Costello (King Of Broken Hearts) and he even asked if anyone was a fan of the band the Grateful Dead, to which there were plenty of cheers, so again he said "here's one I wrote with Robert Hunter" (Patchwork River). Hunter of course was a lyricist for the Dead and was the only non-performer to be inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame as a member of a band. Lauderdale it seems has worked with pretty much everyone and written some country classics in the process.

Probably my highlight was a newer tune from his latest album Country Super Hits Volume 2 (he joked about the title, telling us he hoped other artists would see it and turn the songs into hits), which he said was maybe the first country song written about the subject: Artificial Intelligence. Despite having lyrics like "is it real or deep fake?" it was actually a country crooner that I could imagine George Jones singing! It was funny and fun, that's for sure.

Before his last song, he gave a heartfelt thanks to Emmylou for inviting him to open for her and actually got quite emotional, his voice breaking as he said how it because of her he was able to sing at the Royal Albert Hall, which was a genuinely nice moment. He then ended his enjoyable set with another bluegrass number, Headed To The Hills, which put everyone in a good mood and ready for the headliner, Emmylou.

There was something really sweet the way Emmylou emerged, wearing a long, flowing dress,  in a completely unshowy way at the dot of 8.30pm, stumbling on stage as if not sure if she should be there and immediately calling Jim Lauderdale back on stage with her to sing her opening song, a rather lovely duet of Love Hurts, which of course she first sang with Gram Parsons. As they sang, her band, the Red Dirt Boys, slowly took their places and joined in. It made a nice contrast to the usual route of bigger stars making a big entrance after the band starts playing. To me it summed up how natural and sweet Emmylou always seems.

She looked absolutely radiant, it's so hard to believe she is 79 and this will be her last ever overseas tour (she says she will still play in the US but given how little she plays these days I don't think it will be big tours). She still has that glorious mane of white hair, surely an advertisement for any woman who doesn't want to cut their hair when they get old and white, although few of us are as beautiful as Emmylou.

With the Red Dirt Boys in place (this includes Phil Madeira on keys, Will Kimbrough on guitar, Chris Donohue on bass, Bryan Owings on drums and finally Eamon McLoughlin on fiddle and mandolin), the set-up is a simple one and almost looks too small on the big Royal Albert Hall stage (there are no screens or banners or stage dressings other than the "Highways" festival lights that have been there all weekend), she and her band look like they could easily transpose to a much smaller venue. I really love the simplicity of it: it feels like this is a show just about the songs and the music, not a big performance. It's really proper roots music tonight for sure.

They begin with a track from Emmylou's 2003 album, Stumble Into Grace, the heavenly Here I Am, featuring her breathy vocals."I am the promise never broken, and my arms are ever open," she sings, and it feels reassuring sentiment given this will be her last ever London show.

After this she gives us a run of absolutely superb covers, many that have appeared on her albums over the years, and some that are superior to the originals. She's always been an incredible interpreter of other people's songs but I had forgotten just what exquisite taste she has in choosing her material. I mean, we get Gillian's Welch's Orphan Girl, the Kitty Wells classic Making Believe, as well as a little bit of bluegrass with the Ralph Stanley tune Green Pastures and Get Up John by Bill Monroe.

She then pays tribute to her friend Nanci Griffith, who died back in 2021, telling us before about how the two were dear friends who often sang together and what a wonderful songwriter she was. Her version of Gulf Road Highway would certainly have made her proud, it's beautiful and haunting and a lovely tribute to her old friend.

She also speaks about how Gram Parsons introduced her to maybe the greatest ever country singer, George Jones, whose music she didn't know before. She of course fell in love with his music and now she has every one of his albums. She follows this story with a joyful version of his song One Of These Days. Not many people can cover the Possum, as he had one of the best ever country voices, but boy does Emmylou do it justice, I'm sure old Jones would be looking down from the heavens saying she done him proud.

We also get two incredible Townes Van Zandt covers, introducing them with an anecdote about how she began her career wanting to be a folk singer and in the early days opened for a then unknown Van Zandt when she was playing three shows a night Gerde's Folk City in Greenwich Village. She couldn't get one of his songs out of her head but didn't know the name ("it was before the days of Shazam and all that" she laughs). Eventually she found out it was Pancho & Lefty and covered it on her 1976 album Luxury Liner, making her the first major artist to cover one of his songs. It sounded so good tonight and I saw people singing along, which was incredible. The fact that people now know his songs, well Emmylou certainly played a big part in that.

She then spoke about Don Williams asking her to duet with him on an album and Emmylou requested that they sing another Townes Van Zandt song, the beautiful If I Needed You, which she and the band then played. What a treat to get two Van Zandt songs tonight. I will never tire of his music, especially when covered by such a sublime artist like Emmylou.

Another interesting pair of songs she covered were from British songwriter Paul Kennerley's concept album The Legend Of Jesse James, which she urged us to seek out if we didn't know it. Kennerley was actually Emmylou's third husband, but that wasn't mentioned tonight. Instead she spoke about how she met him when he asked her to sing on the record as Jesse James' wife.  The project also featured Levon Helm singing the part of Jesse James, but the first song she sang tonight was sung by Johnny Cash on the record, Help Him, Jesus, which was a rootin' tootin' cowboy song with lots of lovely mandolin. 

The second song was also from the Jesse James project, but Emmylou told us when she first heard the demo it was written for James' wife but by the time they got to the recording studio, the lyrics were rewritten from a male perspective and Helm and Cash ended up singing it on the record as The Death Of Me. She said she still loved those original lyrics though and asked Kennerley if she could record them for her album Cimarron, and the defiant Born To Run was born. It's been a feature of her set ever since and with it's accordion, mandolin and driving rhythm, it was as foot-tapping fun.

I think it was after this that Emmylou and the band put down their instruments and walked to the edge of the stage to harmonise on an acapella version of Calling My Children Home, showing the strength of their vocals as they effectively echoed through the huge Royal Albert Hall. Absolutely magical.

I have to mention some of Emmylou's self-penned tunes too, which were highlights of her set, most notably the beautiful and poignant Red Dirt Girl, Emmylou's voice trembling in the most evocative way, the haunting Prayer In Open D, played alone by Emmylou on her acoustic guitar, the soaring All The Roadrunning featuring some rousing fiddle and finally, the plaintive Tulsa Queen, making all our hearts ache in the best way possible.

Of course it wouldn't be an Emmylou show without a decent helping of Gram Parsons tunes and, aside from the aforementioned Love Hurts (technically an Everly Brothers song but one she first sang with Gram), she didn't disappoint, with the harmony-laden Flying Burrito Brothers' song Wheels and the bluegrass-infused Luxury Liner.

All of which paved the way for the most breathtaking moment of the night, her absolutely transcendent rendition of Boulder To Birmingham, written after the death of Parsons. It was still spine-chilling to hear those opening lines "I don't want to hear a love song." It's still so powerful over 50 years on and the fact that we are still talking about Parsons is in large part to Emmylou promoting his music and cultivating his legacy. But while he was certainly a mentor to her, Emmylou Harris is actually more important now than Parsons ever was and Boulder To Birmingham is as good as anything he ever wrote, if not better.

She ends the set with Neil Young's Long May You Run, which felt like a goodbye speech to us all and, although warm and loving, also felt rather poignant. Trust Emmylou to break out Neil Young to really make me love her more.

After a standing ovation she returned for just one more, singing her version of the Buck Owens classic, Together Again. She then gave a little curtesy, and a wave and with a huge beaming smile was gone from the stage, but not from our hearts.

It felt so surreal knowing we would never seen her play London again but she was absolutely glowing tonight and certainly went out on a shining high. I'm just so glad I got to see her live five times over the years and even more grateful that I got to see her one final time. Thank you Emmylou.