English Folk

Folk Songs from the Eastern Counties is is the third in a series of four albums recording all 81 of the folk songs in English that Ralph Vaughan Williams arranged for voice and piano or violin. 57 of the 81 songs have not previously been recorded in these arrangements.

This is the first in a series of four albums recording all 80 of the folk songs in English that Ralph Vaughan Williams arranged for voice and piano or violin. 57 of the 80 songs have not previously been recorded in these arrangements, so there is a good deal of unknown - but very beautiful - music to be found here.

A Constant Companion
I have been a working musician for over 20 years now. Music from the British folk tradition has been a constant companion. I grew up in a small market town in East Dorset called Wimborne Minster which has a well established folk festival, a calendar event which started when I was a child. Folk music was part of the everyday experience.
As a young adult I would listen to Fairport Convention, Trees, Mellow Candle & The Pogues alongside Bowie, Nirvana, Neu & Aphex Twin. Catholic tastes.

Le patrimoine folklorique de la péninsule anglaise fut une source fondamentale d’inspiration pour Ralph Vaughan Williams (1872-1958), qui, à l’instar de Bartók ou Kodály en Europe Centrale, y puisa matière à inventer son propre langage mélodique et harmonique, non moins personnel que celui de ses collègues continentaux. En poursuivant l’enregistrement de tous les arrangements de chants populaires réalisés par le compositeur anglais, Albion Records réalise une entreprise d’une haute importance.

The British Folk Revival is the very first historical and theoretical work to consider the post-war folk revival in Britain from a popular music studies perspective. Michael Brocken provides a historical narrative of the folk revival from the 1940s up until the 1990s, beginning with the emergence of the revival from within and around the left-wing movements of the 1940s and 1950s.