New Single: The Lopper and the Landgrabber
From the album and Epping Forest sound installation Echoes: Unearthing Stories of the Forest
The Lopper and the Landgrabber is the first single from my album & sound installation Echoes: Unearthing Stories of the Forest, created during my artistic residency in Epping Forest. The song tells the story of how working-class activism helped save the forest from enclosure during the 19th century.
My main focus for the song is Thomas Willingale, a labourer from Loughton who continued to practise his ancient right of lopping trees in Epping Forest despite strong resistance from the Lord of the Manor. Thomas played an important role in saving Epping Forest and the Willingale story is a wonderful collection of fact and folklore, including court cases, prison sentences and devious plots. There is also a personal connection - he is my 5 x Great Uncle! The folk song’s title takes its name from a William Morris quote. He complained that “the grip of the land grabber is over us all; and commons and heaths of unmatched beauty and wildness have been enclosed for farmers or jerry-built upon by speculators in order to swell the ill-gotten revenues of some covetous aristocrat or greedy money-bag”. The first two verses and first line of the chorus are from poems The Mores and Remembrances by John Clare, who lived for some time at Fairmead House in High Beach, a private asylum run by Dr Matthew Allen. The ‘mind-forg’d manacles’ – a nod to William Blake’s London – are a call to remove the mental chains that restrict those that do not question injustice. You can read more over on my blog here.
I’m joined on this track by Thom Ashworth (vocals, bass, mandolin) and Fran Foote (vocals).
Enclosure came and trampled on the grave
Of labours rights and left the poor a slave
Each little tyrant with his little sign
Shows where man claims earth glows no more divine
It levelled every bush and tree and hill
Hung moles for traitors though the brook runs still
And birds and trees and flowers without a name
All sighed when lawless law’s enclosure came
Enclosure like a Bonaparte let not a thing remain
No rest until it’s torn apart, the landgrabbers’ claim
Old Tom made his living on the land
And at the stroke of midnight made his stand
He lopped a branch from winter’s leafless oak
To save the forest for the Common folk
Back to the inn he entered with the limb
And held it high before the crowd within
No Lord would part him from his ancient right
As he leapt the fence upon St Martin’s Night
The lords and ladies take what’s yours and mine
But lop a branch and you shall do the time
You’ll pick the tarry oakums, tread the mill
For gathering fuel to beat the winter’s chill
Remove those mind-forged manacles and see
The forest’s fate depends on you and me
And beauty all around you’ll never lack
Cos in the end we’ll go and steal it back
Echoes: Unearthing Stories from the Forest is available to order now.
The sound installation runs from 12.11.2019 – 05.01.2020
The View Visitor Centre, Chingford, Epping Forest (FREE - just turn up!)
Artist-In-Residence Epping Forest
I’ve been invited by City of London Epping Forest to be its Artist in Residence in 2019.
If you follow me on Instagram you may have recently noticed an influx of photos of trees, mushrooms and ponds. I am excited to announce that I’ve been invited by City of London Epping Forest to be Artist in Residence in 2019 - a whole year let loose in the forest to explore nature, local history and sound.
Having lived near the forest all my life, I'm in my element researching how people have shaped Epping Forest throughout the centuries: you can find Iron Age camps, medieval roads, a Tudor hunting lodge, an C18th grotto, pollarded trees, ponds created by WWII bombs, and maybe even Dick Turpin’s hideout!
Although most of my reading is online, it’s lovely to have some books to dip into. Some of the older ones I own belonged to my Great Grandfather, who lived on Smarts Lane in Loughton. I’ll shed some light on my family connections to the history of the forest in another blog.
Over the coming months I will be writing music inspired by the stories and the places I visit in the forest. If you want to follow my progress, please sign up to my newsletter and follow me on Instagram I Facebook I Twitter.
Forest Focus Magazine announces my residency on pages 5 and 13.
My project will be linked to Waltham Forest’s year as London Borough of Culture 2019, a Mayor of London initiative, and will integrate with an exciting new project called ‘The People’s Forest’ which is being curated by Luke Turner and Kirsteen McNish.
Want to visit Epping Forest? The London Overground connects London Liverpool Street to Epping Forest at Chingford and the Central Line offers access points to the forest from Leytonstone through to Epping.
Stick In The Wheel
Stick In The Wheel 2018 round-up
I’ve tried to put a selection of mobile phone snaps and screen grabs in some sort chronological order but to be honest, this year with Stick In the Wheel is all a bit of a blur! We have travelled the length and breadth of the British Isles and made it across the Channel once, to Gooikoorts Festival in Belgium, where we were handed the heatwave rider essential for all bands - frozen towels. There’s been sell-out shows, big shows (main stage at Cambridge Folk Festival was an experience!) and awesome smaller shows like at our local, the Wanstead Tap.
We released our second album in January (Follow Them True) which got to No 17 in the Official UK Indie Album Charts, and had some pretty special things said about it, which was nice. Did a number of radio live sessions (Mark Radcliffe Radio 2 Folk Show, Tom Robinson 6Music, John Kennedy Radio X), and released a mixtape in November (This and the Memory of This). Fran and Si also managed to have a baby in the middle of it all (Robin Foote 13.06.18).
There’s so so much more …. check out some of the photos and videos below and visit our website for albums, 2019 gigs, news and all that: www.stickinthewheel.com
banner photo from Wanstead Tap by @kjmartin88
Guest Presenter for ResonanceFM
My show focused on new releases from the folk and contemporary classical worlds.
This year I’ve been guest presenter for The Nest Collective Hour on Resonance 104.4FM. It’s been a lot of fun building playlists for the show, which have focused on new releases from the traditional folk and contemporary classical worlds.
I’ve had some great live guests too, including Moore Moss Rutter, You Are Wolf, Jo Quail, Santiago Quartet and Cunning Folk.
My Top 5 favourite new releases played this year:
Maarja Nuut & Ruum: Haned Kadunud (Muunduja)
Anna & Elizabeth: Ripest of Apples (The Invisible Comes to Us)
Laurie Anderson & Kronos Quartet: Dreams (Landfall)
Missy Mazzoli & Olivia De Prato: Vespers for Violin (Streya)
Richard Thompson: The Rattle Within (13 Rivers)
You can listen to all my shows on mixcloud. Here’s some of my favourites:
