Beth Roberts is a songwriter, vocalist, multi-instrumentalist and producer from Bristol, UK. Her voice carries elements of folksong honesty and choral clarity as she weaves melodic lines over intricate fingerpicked banjo and guitar. There’s a hypnotic intimacy in her performance that invites audiences to commune with the quieter parts of themselves, drawn in by her ever-shifting harmonic patterns. As a solo performer, she has supported a varied spectrum of artists including Orchestre Tour Puissant Marcel Duchamp, Rachel Sermanni, Fran & Flora, The Magic Lantern, Martha Tilston, Solana and Haiku Salut. She’s currently preparing to record her debut solo album.
Since 2017, she has been writing and performing with psychfolk trio Hands of the Heron, known for their mesmerising vocal harmonies and reverberant songwriting. With them, she has performed in a huge variety of spaces from Bristol Cathedral to Summer’s End Prog Festival, completing an 18-date UK tour in October 2024 to launch their third album Quiet Light, a record which she co-wrote & co-produced.
She is half of poetry/soundscape duo House of Figs, creating an otherworldly choir with voice and electronics around Beth Calverley’s tenderly powerful poetry and exploring collaborative improvisations. They debuted their co-written theatre piece The Awkward Guide to Friendship in November 2023, followed by an R&D residency at Theatre Royal Plymouth in September 2024 and well-received performances around the South West.
She plays violin and double bass in Hedera, an instrumental quintet playing original & traditional music inspired by folk traditions from across the world through a lens of contemporary classical & minimalist forms. Hedera sold out their debut UK tour in 2024, playing prestigious venues including King’s Place (London) and Folk East Festival.
She’s a member of ascendant vocal & percussion ensemble Tryani Collective, who have performed to huge crowds at Fire in the Mountain and Shambala Festival, and she has toured in Germany and the UK with fellow sonic experimentalists Ben Osborn and Malo Moray as Trialogue. She has collaborated on stage and in the studio with notable emerging artists Emily Isherwood, Waldo’s Gift, Aellin, Amy Yon, Fritillaries, Rowan Elliott and Ishmael Ensemble.
She co-founded Cuculi Records in 2020 with Heron bandmate Bec Garthwaite, and has subsequently produced and released collections by songwriters Claire Vine, Bea Piper and Anna Anise. Other artists on the label include Something Sleeps, Fritillaries and Thomas Calladine. She curates Cuculi Presents, a popular ongoing series of intimate gigs in listening spaces around East Bristol featuring artists from the label, as well as upcoming acts from around the UK including Fran & Flora, Rachael Dadd, Spindle Ensemble, JOW, tlk, Amy May Ellis, Tamsin Elliott & Tarek Elazhary and Abderraouf Ouertani.
She teaches singing and music theory, and has led workshops encouraging adults to overcome vocal inhibitions and find a more effortless way of singing. She occasionally writes about music in a space called Burnout Musicology.
Cuculi Records 