Before the author Robert Macfarlane and artist Jackie Morris published their book ‘The Lost Words – Spell Songs‘ in 2017, I can still recall the shock of reading that words like ‘acorn’ ‘bluebell’ and ‘buttercup’ were being dropped in favour of words such as ‘broadband’ and ‘cut and paste’ in the Oxford Junior Dictionary. While the publishers stood by their action stating that the dictionary reflects words commonly used I’m definitely from the camp that dictionaries should also be about extending our knowledge. In an article from The Guardian, Robert MacFarlane summed it up perfectly:
“We do not care for what we do not know, and on the whole, we do not know what we cannot name. Do we want an alphabet for children that begins ‘A is for Acorn, B is for Buttercup, C is for Conker’; or one that begins ‘A is for Attachment, B is for Block-Graph, C is for Chatroom’?”
This loss of language is continuing all the time, something that was brought home to me more than ever when reading MacFarlane’s Sunday Times No 1 bestseller Landmarks – a field guide to the literature of nature, and a glossary containing thousands of remarkable words used in England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales to describe land, nature and weather. Since reading it I’ve become more aware of how, as a society, we’ve foolishly been led astray from our relationship with nature. I’ve always had a strong urge to connect with nature – it led to me to up my roots and move to the countryside of the South West to bring up a family – I know I’m not alone. You only need to look at the bestsellers in your local bookshop to realise there is a thirst for knowledge and connection to nature – writers such as MacFarlane and John Lewis-Stempel adorn shelves (In fact, one current bestseller is a book on pebble hunting from 1954 – Clarence Ellis’s ‘The Pebbles on the Beach‘).
If you’re looking for some inspiration then check Robert Macfarlane’s twitter account as he is still very much carrying the flag against word-extinction through his “word of the day”.
Word of the day: “Eremocene” – “the Age of Loneliness”; the “miserable future” into which we are accelerating as a species, characterised by the existential & material isolation that comes from having calamitously extinguished other forms of life on Earth (coined by E.O. Wilson). pic.twitter.com/0wP6k4HXA6
— Robert Macfarlane (@RobGMacfarlane) December 11, 2018
There are also a lot of artists from the folk world that continue to take inspiration from nature to create music. Off the top of my head recent ones include – Kitty Macfarlane’s ‘Namer of Clouds‘, Karine Polwart’s A Pocket of Wind Resistance, You are Wolf’s KELD (an old word referring to “the deep, still, smooth part of a river”) and Toby Hay’s debut album The Gathering – Robert MacFarlane co-wrote the liner notes for the latter.
With that in mind, it should come as no surprise that it is the folk world that have chosen to turn ‘The Lost Words – Spell Songs’ into a musical project.
Commisioned by Folk by the Oak, Spell Songs brings together eight remarkable musicians, whose music already engages deeply with landscape and nature, to respond to the creatures, art and language of The Lost Words. They are Karine Polwart, Julie Fowlis, Seckou Keita, Kris Drever, Kerry Andrew, Rachel Newton, Beth Porter and Jim Molyneux.
Spell Songs will allow these acclaimed and diverse musicians to weave together elements of British folk music, Senegalese folk traditions, experimental and classical music, and create an inspiring new body of work.
Following a creative residency in Herefordshire in January 2019 the new songs will be toured at select venues in February 2019. Further ‘one off’ performances will follow throughout 2019; including at Folk by the Oak festival on Sunday 14th July. An album will be released later in 2019.
February 2019 Concert Dates
08 Fri – Snape Maltings Concert Hall, Snape Bridge, Snape, Suffolk
09 Sat – Birmingham Town Hall, Victoria Square, Birmingham
10 Sun – Royal Northern College of Music, 124 Oxford Road, Manchester
12 Tue – Queen Elizabeth Hall, Southbank Centre, London