The Clay Hymnal was a specially commissioned project by the Bodmin Moor Poetry Festival and funded by FEAST to celebrate the centenary of Jack Clemo’s birth. Folk singer Jim Causley teamed up with Cornish author and Clemo expert Luke Thompson to create a magical album of musical settings of the poems of Jack Clemo’s bard of Clay Country. This album was specially commissioned to celebrate Jack Clemo’s centenary in 2016. It was recorded in Clemo’s home village of St Stephen-in-Brannel and features a backing band of the cream of the Cornish folk scene including Neil Davey, Kerensa Wright, Richard Trethewey and Steve Hunt as well as the angelic voices of the Brannel School Choir.
Tracklist
- The Harassed Preacher
- Sufficiency
- Gwindra
- The Blacksmith
- The Flooded Clay-Pit
- Gulls Nesting Inland
- Christ in the Clay-Pit
- The Clay-Dry
- A Calvinist in Love
- Wedding Eve
Notes
Jack Clemo (1916 – 1994) was a Cornish poet and writer who was strongly associated with the Clay Country. He left school at 13 and progressively lost both his sight and his hearing. His writing career started with dialect stories for the local press. In 1948 his novel “The Wilding Graft” received critical acclaim and his autobiography “Confessions of a Rebel” published the following established his reputation as an original and evocative author. He was made a Bard of Gorsedh Kernow in 1970 taking the Bardic name Prydyth an Pry, Poet of the Clay. For a full biography of Jack Clemo Luke Thompson, Clay Phoenix (Ally Press, 2016).
Jim Causley: “Since the release of his debut album in 2005, Causley’s unique voice and persona have helped him become one of the most well-loved and respected figures of today’s contemporary roots and folk scene. A prolific collaborator, Causley is hugely admired for his work with iconic groups The Devil’s Interval and Mawkin:Causley as well as playing, touring and recording alongside Waterson:Carthy, John McCusker, Eddie Reader, Graham Coxson, Shirley Collins, Michael Morpurgo, Show of Hands, Kate Rusby, David Rotheray of Beautiful South fame and many more.” ( www.jimcausley.co.uk )
“The Clay Hymnal” album is available at www.jimcausley.co.uk
For a full biography of Jack Clemo see Luke Thompson, Clay Phoenix (Ally Press, 2016).