Episode 143: Katherine Jenkins
Spinning Plates with Sophie Ellis-Bextor
Kat Rulach
4.8 • 527 Ratings
🗓️ 27 January 2025
⏱️ 67 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Katherine Jenkins is a Welsh mezzo-soprano classical singer from Neath. She won Welsh Choirgirl of the Year aged 10, and became more widely known when she sang at Westminster Cathedral in 2003 to mark the Pope’s silver jubilee. Since then she has released numerous classical and classical crossover albums.
When we met last week Katherine was heading to the studio to work on a new album. She continues to write, record and perform concerts all over the world.
She has two children: Aaliyah aged 9 and Xander aged 6. She told me how she tries to keep them grounded, and enjoys Friday night dance parties with them. Now that sounds familiar!
Katherine spoke movingly about losing her Dad aged 15 and how she still has a word with him to this day, just before any performance.
We also spoke, singer to singer, about how we look after our voices. Katherine has 24 hour voice rest before any performance. I definitely need to up my game. Although, I’m not actually sure I could stop talking for 24 minutes, let alone 24 hours!
Spinning Plates is presented by Sophie Ellis-Bextor, produced by Claire Jones and post-production by Richard Jones.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello, I'm Sophia Lusbexter and welcome to Spinning Plates, the podcast where I speak to |
| 0:09.6 | to busy working women who also happen to be mothers about how they make it work. |
| 0:14.1 | I'm a singer and I've released seven albums in between having my five sons aged 16 months to 16 |
| 0:19.6 | years, so I spin a few plates myself. |
| 0:21.6 | Being a mother can be the most amazing thing, |
| 0:24.6 | but can also be hard to find time for yourself and your own ambitions. |
| 0:27.6 | I want to be a bit nosy and see how other people balance everything. |
| 0:31.6 | Welcome to spinning plates. |
| 0:33.6 | Good morning. |
| 0:36.6 | It is for me anyway. It is Thursday morning. It's just gone six. I've been up for, well, my youngest got me up at half-past five, which is pretty antisocial. And I did try to push back on that. He is very insistent that the morning he was started and he looks |
| 0:58.0 | quite funny because he's lost another front tooth. He's got a massive gap across the top now. |
| 1:03.3 | I need to practice the words to see what he can say. It does look cute. My brain is definitely |
| 1:10.8 | foggy. I'm about to wake up my thirdborn son, Ray, who gets up at |
| 1:15.7 | 620. In the meantime, just made a cup of tea. I don't mind mornings, but I do love sleep more, |
| 1:22.5 | for sure. And I went to bed a bit late. I had a friend's birthday last night, so I went to bed. |
| 1:27.4 | Not too late, but I've definitely gone midnight bit late. I had a friend's birthday last night, so I went to bed. Not too late, |
| 1:28.1 | but it's definitely gone midnight. So I've had about five hours sleep, all of which bode so |
| 1:33.5 | well for what I'm doing today, which is the album cover shoot. Great. The fates are laughing at me, |
| 1:40.2 | but still, well, okay, sara, soror, whatever it will be. |
| 1:46.2 | And what else I'm out I've been up to? |
| 1:49.2 | Just pottering, really. |
| 1:50.5 | It's been a nice way to start the year because I'm not travelling |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Kat Rulach, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Kat Rulach and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.