Joss Stone on motherhood and winning the Masked Singer: 'You can't take yourself too seriously in a sausage suit'

• Video report by ITV News Arts Editor Nina Nannar

It has been an unusual few weeks for singer Joss Stone.

First she was unmasked as the voice behind the popular sausage character on ITV's The Masked Singer.

And weeks later, she gave birth to her first child - a baby girl called Violet.

Although she knew she was expecting before accepting the offer to perform on the popular Saturday night show, she told ITV News Arts Editor Nina Nannar that pregnancy had a profound impact on her ability to sing.

"I don't know how that happened," she said about her win. "When I was in that sausage suit I couldn’t breathe.

"The suit doesn’t allow a lot of breathing going on but when you have a little baby in you I think it pushes stuff around and then your lungs are like half of what they used to be, it’svery odd."

She added: "I honestly think it’s because the audience found the sausage suit so funny, I honestly think that’s got to be why because it wasn’t the singing.

"If you listen back, you’ll hear my voice going… and my notes are all over the place so it certainly wasn’t that, it was the suit."

But the 33-year-old, who lives in Nashville with her partner Cody DaLuz said she thought it would be a "brilliant idea" to do the show while pregnant.

"She was in my belly when I was in the sausage so she’s been part of it," she said. "I thought this would be fun for her to watch later."

However, she admits that she didn't know much about the show - which pulled in 10.6 million viewers at its peak - before agreeing to take part.

"I don’t watch television that much," she said. "So I didn’t realise the remit."

She added: "I thought on the masked singer you had to unmask once you’d been guessed but that wasn’t it, so I thought, that sounds like fun. I also thought it was a strictly kids show.

"Now I realise actually it is awesome and amazing and there is some serious stuff going on underneath those masks and there’s some serious singers."

But the singer - who completed a world tour in 2019 - said she is no longer taking her career as seriously as she used to.

She said: "I have had my little moments in my life when I have said music is the most important thing in the world and you get into your artists’ self and I tell you what it is not a fun way of living life, it is just stressful and the world is judging you anyway because you are putting music out. And then you join in. That’s not good.

"So I just decided years ago, I am not going to do that, I’m going to base all my decisions on a happiness scale and if it’s over five I’ll do it and if it ain’t I’m not going to do it, that’s why I make decisions like going on Masked Singer. I think you’ve got to choose fun don’t choose serious, if you can avoid it."

She joked: "We can’t take ourselves too seriously in a sausage suit!"

And she said that it was The Masked Singer's sense of fun that made it so popular during lockdown restrictions.

She said: "I think we have had enough of all this tiresome seriousness, it is making people exhausted. I think every person on this planet needs to rest from all that drama.

"And I think maybe the Masked Singer gives that. It’s bright, it’s colourful, it’s fun, it’s not competitive, each person that takes off their mask, they’re happy to be there. It’s all positive, there’s nothing negative about it.

"Whereas you’ve got other singing shows where you see people burst into tears, it breaks their whole heart when they get voted off… it’s a different kind of show. But this is all good, it’s all love, so that must be why."

But it is clear, the production she is most proud of at the moment is her 12-week old daughter who slept throughout the entire interview.

And her career is not her first priority anymore, she said, even before Violet came along.

"I don’t really feel too bothered about it," she said. "But I never want to stop singing because I find it fun.

"I miss my band, miss music, I miss seeing people smile and having that connection but I don’t know whether I need to be nurturing and massaging my career in the way that I did at 17."