IT"S been a hard two years for the entertainment industry but musician Chantel McGregor has been finding new ways to bring live music to her fans.

Chantel, who is most at home performing on stage and will appear at Tavistock Wharf on Sunday (December 5), has certainly not let the grass grow under her feet â?? with weekly live streaming sessions during lockdown and two album releases this year.

’I’m a crazy person,’ she revealed to the Times.’But I wanted to keep playing music and people wanted to keep hearing it.

’We were all in the same boat so I live streamed every Saturday at 5pm and then made albums from all the favourite songs that everyone had requested.

’I would do an an hour of music during the "Shed Sessions" and we would all have some banter. It was great and people liked it, it gave them something to look forward to and a bit of normality during a really weird time.’

The rock star has been performing live since the age of 12 (that’s 23 years ago) and has a musical education.

Her guitar playing father was her inspiration but she said she surprised many people when she was ’shredding the guitar at the age of 12’.

’I don’t think people expected a 12-year-old girl to play guitar like that but it was always the natural thing for me to do. I think I damaged a few egos along the way,’ she added laughing.

Chantel attended Leeds College of Music and became the first student in the college’s history, to achieve a 100% pass mark, with 18 distinctions.  

She left with a First Class Honours degree in Popular Music and a coveted prize, the college’s musician of the year award.Chantel stepped out in the pro-musician world and her stunning live performances demonstrated that she had the ability to perform rock for the new age, played by a musician born with an effortless virtuosity. Since then, she has built a loyal and growing fan base who follow her every move.

If you measure an artist’s prospects by the company they keep, then Chantel has been moving in the right direction. Early in her career, Chantel was invited to perform with Joe Bonamassa, on two of his UK tours.

When Chantel released her 2011 debut album, Like No Other, one critic said, ’Chantel McGregor deserves to be held up as a messiah of blues-rock and given her own mountain. She doesn’t strum or pick her guitar but almost bends and distorts it, as if she’s channelling the ghost of Hendrix through her fingers.’ 

The album was produced by Livingstone Brown, whose production credits include Ed Sheeran, Robin Trower, and Shakira.

The end result was a beautifully crafted debut album that showcased Chantel’s versatility and talent as a singer-songwriter.

She followed her first album with a second in 2015 and was working on a third stdio album when covid hit.

Chantel, who hails from Yorkshire which is where her parents and band are still based but she now lives in Cambridge, describes her music as mainly rock with some progressive rock thrown in as well as some blues and acoustic elements.

She said her music was always evolving and that was what she loved about it.

She is excited to be back playing live and has performed 15 gigs since getting back on the road most recently in Scotland.

For now the band is staying in the UK but hopes to gig abroad as the world gets back to normal following the pandemic.

’It feels strange to be playing live again after all this time but it’s wonderful,’ she said. ’To be able to see family and friends again is good and what I have realised is that people have really missed live music. Music is such an important part of people’s lives and they are really appreciative of it.’

Go to https://www.tavistockwharf.com/home to find out more about Chantel’s gig at Tavistock Wharf.