Written by May Humphreys
This little gem of a CD is full of delightful songs and singing. It probably not your cup of tea if you like loud backing and lots of instrumental accompaniment, but if you like an intimate song with minimal interference from backing musicians, this is right up your street. John Dipper who was the technical brain behind this deserves credit for a superb end product. Bob Askew,the mastermind behind the project, is a svengali of the highest order.
Lucy Broadwood visited her cousin Herbert Reynardson in 1892. He lived in Adwell House, Oxfordshire. The gardener's wife, Patience Vaisey was a Hampshire lass and sang her repertoire to Lucy, probably very gladly because her husband the gardener at Adwell didn't like folk songs preferring instead hymns Ancient and Modern. There's no accounting for taste!
The songs are performed here by a select cast of Southern singers. Annie Winter and Alison Frosdick are well known on the trad folk circuit, being regulars at Whitby and other trad festivals. This is the first time I have come across Anna Baldwin and Jack Burnaby who supplies the minimal accompaniment on piano and concertina. His piano playing is very in keeping with the sort of parlour music Lucy Broadwood would have been used to. I was most taken with his little riff at the beginning of When The Moon Stands on Tiptoe. This is a glorious hunting song which is ambiguous in its quarry - human or hare!
There are many songs here that would benefit from more exposure. Many of us know , or at least have heard, My Bonny Bonny Boy, but how many of us know How Sweet in the Woodlands? We have a huge wealth of songs that were collected because somebody out there thought they were worth preserving. Let's get them out there into the folk consciousness. This collection deserves to be much more widely performed.
Thank you to Bob Askew for your dedication to your local heritage. It is a grand job you are doing. Keep plugging away!