Trollheart

Hmm. That does not bode well for the new album, as Ghostory was my only experience of them. I'll get back to you when I've had a chance to hear the new offering.

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Kedvesem

Anaïs Mitchell is most definitely an L on the LPUC scale. I have never heard an album of hers that I have not loved. She combines so many elements of what I love about folk music (which is my favorite genre...), and she does it so effortlessly, so beautifully.

For actual information on Anaïs Mitchell, see my darling Sir's journal.

This entry will focus on only one of her albums, her collaboration with Jefferson Hamer on Child Ballads.


The Child Ballads were originally published in the 19th century by Francis James Child, who collected many variations of different folk songs from England and Scotland, preserving them for future generations. These songs have been sung by many folk artists since that time, and I seek them out when I can. But few performances of them can rival, in my opinion, the understated intensity found in Mitchell's collaboration with Hamer. Note, too, that the Child Ballads do not have musical notation, only the lyrics. Any musical setting is provided by the artists performing them.

On to the ballads.


The first ballad in this small collection is "Willie of Winsbury" (Child 100). (The numbering refers to their appearance in the original collections by Child.) Briefly, the plot of this song concerns a King who has long been in prison, and who has only recently been ransomed back to his home. There he finds his daughter, the Princess Jane, is suspiciously pregnant. He presses the princess to reveal her lover, and she does so. The King fully intends to execute the youth, young Willie of Winsbury, for daring to defile the princess. But upon seeing the beautiful young man, the King responds by admitting that he would have taken Willie to his bed, had the King been a woman. So instead of executing Willie, the King offers him the princess' hand in marriage and the position of heir to the throne. Willie accepts the princess, but refuses to become the King's heir, instead taking Princess Jane back to his own little country estate. She goes willingly, forgoing her position to be with Willie.

This interesting reverse of a Cinderella tale, wherein it is the poor youth who gets the princess, is moving precisely because it is so real, so true to the inconsistencies of human behavior. In fact, when Willie rides off with the princess, the King makes no objection, but I am left suspecting the King envies his daughter...






The second ballad, "Willie's Lady" (Child 6), concerns another yet another Willie, but not the same one. In this one, Willie is the King, who has married against his mother's wishes. His mother has thereupon cursed the young Queen to never give birth to the child she is carrying, but instead to die in an unending labor, freeing Willie to marry someone of his mother's choice. Willie offers to give his mother gifts to lift the curse, but always in vain. In the end, the young Queen instructs Willie on how to trick his mother into revealing the means of breaking the curse. Then they follow the instructions his mother unwittingly lets slip, and Willie and his Queen live happily ever after.

Musically, this piece has a repetitive, bouncy feel, as though the listener were accompanying King Willie back and forth on his fruitless rides to his mother's home. It is also a herald of a theme that was touched on tangentially in the previous song, the parental adversity. But in this piece, the adversity is from a mother, not a father, and there is no way of altering. All they can hope for is to outwit her. She has no pity. This theme of maternal disapproval of spousal choice is repeated often in the Child ballads, and on this album, only seven songs in number, there are two that deal with it directly. This question is not one that often shows up in modern life, but in the past parental disapproval (and maternal disapproval, too, not merely paternal, despite what many would seem to argue) could often prevent a match from occurring. This particular ballad shows how the young lovers triumph over this adversity, but that does not always happen. Even in this song, there is much suffering to endure first, and the King despairs to the point of wishing for death well before the end.






The third ballad is "Sir Patrick Spens" (Child 58), and in it we depart from the theme of marriage, at least regarding the hero of the song. In this, the King has arranged to marry a princess from Norway, and he wants to send for her at once. He hears that Sir Patrick Spens is the best captain, and the King orders Sir Patrick to sail at once for Norway to bring back the princess. Sir Patrick is sorrowful to receive this order, for he is indeed the best sailor of the day--and he knows that to sail now for Norway is a death sentence. But there is no arguing with the King. Sir Patrick sails, along with all the King's nobles. And the ship is battered with a storm and sinks, going down with all hands. Sir Patrick dies, and his wife is left to wander the shores, hoping for the return of her lost lord.

This ballad has a mournful sound from the first, and the imagery, from the "blood red wine" to the "lady fair with a comb and a glass in her hand", is as haunting as the delicate strings that accompany the softly blending voices of Mitchell and Hamer.






The fourth ballad is "Riddles Wisely Expounded" (Child 1). Its plot leaves behind for the first time royalty and nobility. A man seeks shelter at a cottage on a cold night, and he is taken in by three sisters. They offer him food and shelter, and the youngest sister spends the night in his bed and in his arms. In the morning, she asks him to marry her. He agrees, on condition she can answer his riddles. She does so, and they marry.

In this piece, Hamer takes the lead, unlike in the others so far, and when it comes to the youth singing out his riddles, one gets the sense that the youth is not trying to weasel out of marrying the girl but rather wanting to make sure that she is as wise as she is lovely. Mitchell's soft but confident replies show that when the youth marries the girl, they will be as happy as the lilting tunes promise. But there is definitely a sense of risk in what the girl has done, for if he had refused her, she would have been ruined altogether. This song is one of the brightest on the album, for the test the girl must go through is brief and simple. The charm of it lies in the imagery of the riddles and in the surprising depth of their responses.






The fifth ballad is "Clyde Waters" (Child 216), and it is darker even than "Sir Patrick Spens". In it we return to the theme of maternal opposition. Once again, we have a William for a hero. Sweet William is wooing Maid Margaret, and his mother objects. He tells his mother of his plan to visit Maid Margaret, and the mother tries to convince him to stay home, contrasting the comforts of the house with the coming storm. When that fails, his mother curses Sweet William should he go, curses him unto death. Sweet William braves the curse and goes to visit his beloved. He rides through the storm and crosses the flooding River Clyde. He tells the river to spare him as goes and take him on his return. The river does not catch him, and he rides to Maid Margaret's house, calling out to her to let him in, for he is soaked with rain and Clyde water. But the door does not open, and the lady within calls out that her barns are full of gentlemen's horses, her house is full of noble guests. She refuses him entry, and he tells her farewell, telling her of the curse his mother laid on him. Then he rides back, and the River Clyde sweeps the heartbroken youth in and drowns him. Only in the hour that he drowns, does Maid Margaret awaken and tell her mother of the dark dream she had, in which her lover came to the gate and was refused entry. Her mother mocks her, saying that it was no dream and that the mother, pretending to be Margaret, had sent Sweet William away, convinced Margaret did not love him. Maid Margaret runs out into the dark storm and goes searching for her lover, whom she finds in the heart of the river, and they sleep forever in each other's embrace, victims of their mothers' hatred.

This song is heartbreakingly lovely from the first note to the last, and the way it follows Sweet William's defiance of his mother ("The good steed that I ride upon/Cost me thrice thirty pounds/I'll put my trust in his swift feet/To keep me safe and sound") through to the part where, silent and sorrowful, the River Clyde pulls him from his horse--and he does not even struggle, is perfect. The song, too, does not reveal that Maid Margaret was true to him until after his death, letting the listener assume Sweet William died betrayed, because that is what he assumes, too. Maid Margaret is more straightforward in her search for death than Sweet William was, for she is certain that only in death will she find her love again. They are brother and sister in that they both share such cruel mothers, and that flawless, painfully perfect ending is gut-wrenching.

Mitchell and Hamer are clearly aware of this, for though they follow it with another dark ballad, the presentation of that ballad focuses on light and defiance throughout. But I am getting ahead.






The sixth ballad is "Geordie" (Child 209), and it tells the story of a young matron who rides into London to petition the judges there to release her husband, Geordie. He is under arrest for poaching, and she begs for his life. She argues that he has not injured any of those there, nor has he done anything gravely wrong. But her petition is refused, and the judge dismisses her, saying Geordie has already been condemned. When she pleads that she is carrying Geordie's seventh child at that very moment, the judge says they'll give Geordie a high-class execution and his six sons can carry the coffin. The young matron then defies the judge, challenging him to a duel with sword and pistol in the city square, wanting to fight for the life of her Geordie.

But the ballad ends there. There is no duel. The challenge goes unanswered, and the defiance is fruitless in the end. In this instance, the bright, defiant music is at odds with the unhappy ending, but they mesh so perfectly that this is quite clearly intentional. Hamer takes the lead on this song, and he is a superior guitarist to Mitchell, so the young matron's challenges are primarily carried on a masculine voice, albeit a sweet one. This has the odd effect of making this unhappy ending song a respite between the heart-twisting "Clyde Waters" and the deeply disturbing "Tam Lin" that follows.






The seventh and final ballad on the album is "Tam Lin" (Child 39). This one tells the story of Tam Lin, the Lord of Carterhaugh, who was captured by the Faerie Queen. He becomes something of a bogey, requiring "tribute" of the maids who pass through his lands. Lady Jane goes there, and Tam Lin challenges her. She responds defiantly, so he rapes her, impregnating her. She goes back to her home and becomes sorrowful, missing Tam Lin, and when her pregnancy is discovered, her father worries that no one will be able to give her child a name. Lady Jane returns to Carterhaugh and threatens to kill the child before his birth, for the child has no earthly father, only a wild shade. Tam Lin tells her how to break the spell on him, which entails "taking him back into her arms". This will win his love, as well as breaking the spell. He warns her, though, that he will become a wolf, a bear, and a lion in her arms. She accepts the challenge, and she passes. She holds him and does not fear him. This breaks the Faerie Queen's curse on him, and he becomes a man once more, whom she leads home and marries.

There are many variants of this ballad and the story it is based on, some dealing in more detail with the Faerie Queen and her possessiveness of Tam Lin, as well as her hatred of Lady Jane for defeating her. The idea that the woman might love the man who forced her is unpalatable to some, but it has a wide following, too. This piece takes up the theme of the woman fighting for her love that "Geordie" began, but though the overall musical feel of "Tam Lin" is much darker, more suited to the twisted fairy tale, Lady Jane succeeds where Geordie's wife failed. This ballad is a topsy-turvy thing, for it takes the idea of a man winning a woman's love and flips it. Lady Jane must win Tam Lin's love, for he has suffered at a woman's hands (the Faerie Queen is quite the villainess...), and this sense of being backwards is also carried by the subtly sensual, yet darkly rich melodies of the piece. It sounds as though it should be sad, should even be frightening, but it ends happily, with Lady Jane having won her "own true love" back from the Faerie Queen.


When I listen to this album, I am invariably moved. The restrained intensity of the melodies and the weight of the past on the lyrics combine perfectly to ravish my heart and mind together, leaving me bewitched.

OccultHawk

lol

Just checking this out. It’s got a moment here and there but you pretty much called it. It’s funny what you find when you utfse

Btw, How’s the fam?

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Trollheart

I prefer Ghostory

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The Batlord

She's gone, dude.

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