Lauren McCormick - On Bluestockings (2016)

Tracklist

01. A Game of Cards
02. Trees Grow High
03. One Too Many Mornings
04. A Sprig of Thyme
05. Everybody Knows
06. The Old Garden Gate
07. Lady Isobel
08. A Song for My Mother
09. Dear Mary
10. Lucy: Meaning Light
11. The Cuckoo

With the talented triumvirate of Dave Delarre (guitars), James Delarre (fiddle) and Roz Gladstone (cello) at her disposal Lauren McCormick take on trad songbook was always going to offer something different: her striking version of ‘The Cuckoo’ draws out a bleakness seldom heard – even a repetitive flourish from Dave’s guitar doesn’t lift it from an inky well. It works. And it’s a place where they conjure further results: ‘Trees Grow High’, an amalgamation of versions, gets a drawn out deathly conclusion with a darkly glimmering combination of strings and vocals. A feat repeated on ‘The Old Garden Gate’, a song learnt whilst involved in the Song Links II project with Shirley Collins and Martyn Wyndham Reed. The title’s theme is derived from ‘The Bluestocking Circle’, a Victorian movement of women and men who believed in education for all, and paved the way for many woman to progress in walks of life where men were dominant. The theme is visited during Lauren’s own self explanatory intimate portrait, ‘A Song For My Mother’. Another track credited to Lauren utilizes the tune of The Rambling Comber and teams it with the tale of Bluebeard. It probably shouldn’t work but is played with such gusto and imagination it’s somehow irresistible. The contemporary selections are a mixed bag: ‘One Too Many Mornings’ has lost the washed out melancholy of Dylan’s original but hasn’t really gained a replacement. Leonard Cohen’s ‘Everybody Knows’ fares better as the Delarres combine with Lauren’s impassioned reading to tune ears afresh to the striking words. And the bold arrangement of Linda and Richard Thompson’s ‘Dear Mary’ also makes for a more than worthy inclusion in this sometimes uneven yet skillfully executed collection.

Lauren McCormick, vocals, flute
Dave Delarre, guitars
James Delarre, violin
Roz Gladstone, cello

DOWNLOAD ALBUM [flac]