Oxford, England, to Irish parents) is a British female singer-songwriter.

She began her career

working in a recording studio, where she was discovered by her now long-time collaborator,
producer and sometime co-songwriter Nigel Stonier. Gilmore released her first album, Burning
Dorothy, as a teenager in 1998 and over the course of the next four years, released increasingly
well-received albums that earned her a reputation in the UK music press but no chart success.
She finally made a breakthrough at 23 with the release of Avalanche in August 2003, which
became her first album to break into the Official UK Album Chart, at #62, and spawned two
minor hit singles. Gilmore is said to have become interested in music as a result of her father's
record collection, which included work by Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Elvis Costello, and Tom
Waits, among others. At 16 she left home and began working in a recording studio where she
was discovered by her now long-time collaborator, producer and sometime co-songwriter Nigel
Stonier, who became her husband in a ceremony in October 2005. Thea recorded her debut
album aged just 17 and then entered a spell of productivity which, in the four and a half years
from January 1999 to August 2003, saw her record and release six albums including four
"official" releases and two cult albums which were only intended for internet release but which
have long since been available in the shops. In 2001, with the release of Rules For Jokers, she
hit some kind of national nerve and garnered some attendant airplay but it wasn't until 2003's
Avalanche that Thea finally began to make significant waves. Avalanche became Radio 2's
Album Of The Week and spawned two hit singles including her first certifiable Top 40 hit Juliet.
Thea has gathered countless plaudits over the years - "the best British singer songwriter of the
last ten years - and then some" (Uncut), "so good its scary" (Mojo), and "Gilmore is already in a
league of her own" (Q) immediately spring to mind - but Avalanche was truly a quantum leap
forward and "a breakthrough record" (Times) to boot. And you can bet that Thea remains the
only artiste to have her under-$50 video shown on Top Of The Pops. Increasing radio support
and acclaim from the music press led to a lucrative tour of the US in 2004, in support of
legendary folksinger Joan Baez. During this time, Gilmore was diagnosed with clinical
depression and also split from her personal relationship with Nigel Stonier after seven years,
although they continued touring and working together. In 2005, Gilmore continued touring
commitments, for the first time not releasing a new album (the covers collection Loft Music was
widely released during 2004). In October 2005, she and Stonier, who, in the light of Gilmore's
depression diagnosis, re-started their personal relationship, married in a ceremony near their
home in Cheshire. Gilmore finally returned to recording with the release of Harpo's Ghost in
August 2006, after a three-year absence of new material. The album was once again acclaimed
in the music press and UK radio lent their support to the single "Cheap Tricks." Gilmore has
been touted by Uncut magazine as "the best British singer-songwriter of the last 10 years...and
then some" and has gained steady acclaim for each of her