Ironstone Tales – the second album by Words of A Fiddler’s Daughter – the album will be released July 1 2022
Rosedale. A valley that once reeled under the exploitation of Victorian industry, filled with smoke, the roar of furnaces and the clamour of three thousand workers. The Yorkshire Klondike, as it was known.
Now, ruins act as monuments to ambition and failure – the extraordinary engineering of the railway, the mines and the kilns never really paid off. More sheep than people now watch the stones fall and the buildings crumble. Ring ouzels perch where exhausted men once slept, peregrine falcons startle and fly from the inside of cold furnaces, curlews and lapwings compete in spring to create the valley’s soundtrack.
Jessie’s poems spiral out from the real stories of the valley, facts and history combining with her love of folk tales and memories of her childhood spend playing amongst the ruins. Here in the very spots that inspired each poem, she interweaves her words with the music created in that specific moment by Adam and Murray.
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In-the-moment improvisers, duo The Cider House Rebellion (Master accordionist Murray Grainger and award-winning fiddle player Adam Summerhayes) join Jessie Summerhayes for this collection of spontaneous tunes, inspired by the Rosedale Valley and its incredible industrial history. The second release in the wider project – Ironstone Tales – The first being the duo’s instrumental release ‘Genius Loci 2: The Valley of Iron’.
Part three of the project will be and a series of spectacular videos containing live performances interweaved with stunning footage of the landscape, Jessie’s poetry, and spoken word histories of its people and industry.