Song Stories – The Felton Sycamores
Categories: Song Stories
This song’s about The Battle of Dunbar, Oliver Cromwell, the forced march southwards of the defeated Scottish soldiers, three sycamores on the north road out of Felton, Northumberland, a local choir, a poet and a composer!
As part of The Bridge Singers “Rivers, Bridges and Other Village Friends” recital in May 2016, which was to be all about the local area in some way, we premiered a new song, The Felton Sycamores.
I asked my friend Tony Williams the poet if he had a poem about sycamores. He said no, but he’d write one. This casual request resulted in the song “The Felton Sycamores” which is a local history song for our village. It refers to Oliver Cromwell who is rumoured to half come through here before and after the Battle of Dunbar in 1650. I documented the progress of this song in a radio-style documentary which culminates in the world premiere performance.
This recording below tells the story of the poem and song in the words of Cheryl,
Tony,
Oliver Cromwell (voiced by Bob George),
Sir Arthur Heselrig (voiced by Richard Evans),
members of The Bridge Singers,
with music performed by the choir,
Cheryl,
Chris and Hazel Metherell.
If you would like just to listen to the song:
Thank-you for this beautiful offering. I feel as if I’ve been to a memorial service for the Scottish prisoner-of-war soldiers, two of which are my multiple-great grandfathers and one is the multiple-great-grandfather to my husband and our four children. They survived the battle, forced march and the trip to the New World in the fall of 1650. I am also the owner and administrator of the Scottish Prisoners of War blog/website at http://www.scottishprisonersofwar.com. I will be sharing this really fantastic creation of yours.