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Great to see our bicentenary commemoration of the 1819 Thunderstorm and the tragic story of Susan Nobes now has a permanent home here on BBC Norfolk.

https://norfolkonfilm.tumblr.com   

As featured on https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0832p98 (exactly one hour in) 

For those who have come to this blog from those links, here is some extra information from last summer. I particularly recommend this 12 minute extravaganza a one off dramatic representation of the 1819 storm and its accounts  

BICENTENARY EVENTS COMMEMORATING THE 1819 THUNDERSTORM

A small group of historians and creative artists will on Friday July 5 2019 mark the bicentenary of the Thunderstorm That Took Place In Sedgeford in the County of Norfolk on Fifth July 1819” a storm so violent it was recorded in the Register of World News blasting a yardwide hole in the Church tower and taking the life of Susan Nobes, a 14 year old village girl. There are 2 events planned.

1. At the Ladywell, a memorial for Susan hosted by village historian Tim Snelling. Sedgeford residents poet Gareth Calway and harpist Vanessa Wood-Davies will share their "Ballad of Susan Nobes" (https://soundcloud.com/gaz29-1/the-ballad-of-susan-nobes-performed-loveheartsredwine) along with Gareth's reading of Janet Hammond's distinctive verses about the tragedy and the Ladywell boulder. Finally, Andy Wall and Gareth will sing and play their new especially composed "Elegy for Susan Nobes."  All of this event will be filmed and be made publicly available online.
2. At the Boneyard Field, in starting at 7.30 pm, in a showcase evening Gareth Calway, Melanie Calway, Vanessa Wood-Davies and Andy Wall and will perform an evening of musical histories. The centre piece of this evening event will be  a one off dramatic representation of the 1819 storm and its accounts at 9 pm (online films of much of this are also available) 

During the dreadful thunderstorm on the Evening of July 5th the electric fluid struck the top of Sedgeford Church Steeple on the West Side, and precipitated to the ground several stones of considerable magnitude making a breach in the wall of about a yard square. The lightning also passed through the Church entering in at a window near the porch on the South side; and after crossing in a North East direction, it made its escape at two places in an upper window near the Chancel on the North side". (as reported in the Times, the Ipswich Journal and the Register of World News 1819-20)

"Come the evening, folk were going about their daily tasks, working in the fields while birds sweetly sang. The teacher sat in the porch waiting for the schoolmaster to appear before Bible reading class could begin, meanwhile the attending children happily played, running up and down the churchyard, little knowing the impending doom that was to befall them. The schoolmaster duly arrived, readings began and when done was followed with a final hymn, 'Oh let me, heavenly Lord extend, My view to life's approaching end... . "(Religious tract 1819, probably by the then Curate of Sedgeford.) 

The Ballad of Hereward The Wake by Waywood - World Premiere

Welcome -you are the 100+ reader of this post.

Published below for the first time the full text of our new ballad "Hereward The Wake."

SPOKEN INTRO…

Twilight in the greenwood, is Hereward  awake?

Grey and ghostly shadows are gliding through the brake,

Shadows of the dappled deer, dreaming of the morn,

Dreaming of a hooded man that winds a shadowy horn.

HARP MUSIC STARTS

In the Lincoln greenwood,

In the Bruneswald,

Yellow-haired, sky-eyed,

Great-hearted and bold,

For the soul of England;

For your own spirit's sake,

Lift your heart and voice up

For Hereward the Wake!

A wild swan, a curlew,

A fen-son, a tiger;

His high blood-tide exiled

By Edward the Confessor.

Performs magic deeds

In Cornwall and Ireland;

Fights fearless and feared

For Flanders, his wife-land.

Family home 'Normaned'

With his brother's severed head;

Returns, puts the murderers'

14 heads there instead.

In the Lincoln greenwood,

In the Bruneswald,

Yellow-haired, sky-eyed,

Great-hearted and bold,

For the soul of England;

For your own spirit's sake,

Lift your heart and voice up

For Hereward the Wake!

As free as the waters

That flow through the fen,

As the wide heaven-skies

In the eyes of good men,

To the Saxon Abbot

Of Ely he speeds;

Lords, with King Sweyn of Denmark,

Its marsh, mere and reeds.

Raids Peterborough Abbey,

Frees God's Saxon gold

From the thief-Norman grip

Of the tyrant monk Turold.

In the Lincoln greenwood,

In the Bruneswald,

Yellow-haired, sky-eyed,

Great-hearted and bold,

For the soul of England;

For your own spirit's sake,

Lift your heart and voice up

For Hereward the Wake!

From the Normans learns war,

From Flems love, bonds with Danes

But when King Sweyn makes peace,

Stays true to the thanes.

With Saxon Earl Morca

Defends Ely Isle

Fights war-craft and witch-fire

With fire, bow and guile.

The Norman machine

Cannot conquer that fastness;

Greed's causeway sinks

In full armour and harness.

In the Lincoln greenwood,

In the Bruneswald,

Yellow-haired, sky-eyed,

Great-hearted and bold,

For the soul of England;

For your own spirit's sake,

Lift your heart and voice up

For Hereward the Wake!

His wood-spirit leaves-drops

The Conqueror's hush-biz

Then is gone like a breeze

Through the secret rushes.

Though our monks will give up,

Afraid for their lands,

Their arms and his paths,

He will slip through their hands.

As free as the waters

That flow through the fens,

As the wide heaven-skies

In the eyes of good men.

In the Lincoln greenwood,

In the Bruneswald,

Yellow-haired, sky-eyed,

Great-hearted and bold,

For the soul of England;

For your own spirit's sake,

Lift your heart and voice up

For Hereward the Wake!

© Gareth Calway 2017

This celebration of Hereward is folk duo Waywood's latest. The world premiere as performed by the poet with harpist Vanessa Wood-Davies' latest melody was performed  at Hereward's birth-place of Bourne, Lincolnshire on Thursday 7 September, the 950th anniversary of the great Saxon's homecoming.  It tells the famous (and truer than you might think) story of how Hereward - delinquent son of Leofric Lord of Bourne and (some say) Lady Godiva - came to lead the English resistance to William the Conqueror from the woods and the fens, with star turns in the years 1067-72 for Bourne, Peterborough and Ely. The timeless style of Waywood's performance art -  ballad verse and harp as the days of the mead hall - is a perfect fit for this hero tale. Waywood will also be performing homages to Robin Hood and Wicken Fen. And that's only our bit - there's a Bayeux tapestry to see, Hereward scholarship for a popular audience, storytelling, film and much else besides.

Waywood harpist Vanessa Wood-Davie spreparing for action in  Hunstanton last June, 

paying homage to a local Norfolk hero. Pic by Elaine Bird. 

Lancelot and the Grail maiden - Waywood's first album

LANCELOT AND THE GRAIL MAIDEN - click to hear the new Waywood album.

Hear our Soundcloud hit!

We are Waywood. A voice and a  harp telling stories. Here is our contribution to an ageless tradition. We hope you enjoy the new stories of Norfolk we tell.

Next gigs: Bourne, Lincs, 7 Sep.


Lynn Heritage Day, Hanse House, Lynn,  10 Sep

On 10 September, Waywood will be showcasing their new album of Norfolk stories as part of Heritage Day in Lynn.   These stories include homages to the extraordinary number of pioneers Lynn has produced through the ages. Characters like William Sawtrey one time priest of St Margaret's Church (now Lynn Minster) - and in 1401 the first man to be burned for his beliefs in England - and his famous parishioner, Margery Kempe, who combined marriage and fourteen children with a unique visionary life travelling as a pilgrim throughout the Hanseatic world and beyond and also famously wrote the first autobiography in English. Waywood also tell such strange ghost stories of ordinary Norfolk people in history as that of Susan Nobes, who was struck by lightning in Sedgeford Church in 1819 - a ballad that has now had nearly a thousand plays worldwide on Soundcloud - and of Norfolk gentlefolk like the Brown Lady reputed to haunt both Houghton and Raynham Hall.  "The Brown Lady", as the ballad explains, was Dorothy Walpole not just sister of first British Prime Minister (and Lynn MP for 40 years) Sir Robert Walpole but also the wife of 'Turnip' Townshend. The mysterious nature of her death and the assertion that she is the only ghost every to have been photographed (on the stairs of Raynham Hall in 1936!) all add to the crepuscular glamour of this tale. 

Gareth will also rap his "Ballad of Badass King John - As Seen On TV!" for the first time since he did so at the official ceremony unveiling King John's statue in Lynn last October, when the performance was shown on the BBC News. Vanessa will join him for only their second public performance of a ballad commissioned from them by the Borough of West Norfolk and King's Lynn about the other West Norfolk figure honoured last June with a statue - Henry LeStrange, the man who invented New Hunstanton.

Waywood will be introduced by town historian Dr Paul Richards at 1 pm in the Gallery at Hanse House on Heritage Day (Sunday September 10) and will perform for about an hour. The show is free. Audiences are welcome to drop in and stay for a song or two or for the entire concert, whichever they prefer. "We know that visitors have a lot of great things to see and hear in Lynn on that day," commented Gareth.

"It will be worth seeing us just for the costumes!" said Vanessa, who has been busy creating a fetching Robin Hood i' the Greenwood look for the duo's new Hereward material to add to the Lancelot and Grail Maiden chic Waywood enjoyed modelling on their recent album cover. "Not many realised Lancelot was wearing the standard of the Hanseatic League on his tabard for that cover shoot," (see above) Vanessa explained. "But with so much Lynn and Hanseatic material in our repertoire, why wouldn't you?"

Pics below by Bhas Allan, Elaine Bird, David Maile, Joan Wall and Zariah Wood-Davies.

The newly unveiled statue of Henry LeStrange 

Waywood sing his praises

'He carved his vision from carrstone rocks"

"A holiday heaven from his hands"

Lovewood, her work done.

The sculptor and Loveway the poet suffering for their art after the ceremony. 

(This is the easy bit)

No, not REM, Waywood at the album launch.

Lovewood making the harp talk

Lovewood and harp as one

Just to show it wasn't easy making that album cover look easy

Mine's a pint, please, Grail maiden.

The real William Sawtrey, first man to be burned for his beliefs in England

Loveway playing Sawtrey in our Morality Play - "A Nice Guy: The Burning Of William Sawtrey" at the Lynn Fringe in 2015. Lovewood is just out of shot left playing Soul. Bhas Allan ( for once not taking the pics) is the devil telling Sawtrey he's toast.

Waywood harping tall histories (and looking vertically stretched) at the 2016 Heritage day in Lynn

Original press release

Poet Gareth Calway and Harpist Vanessa Wood-Davies, both of Sedgeford,  are releasing a 'craft' album of their Norfolk ballads at the Bury St Edmunds Festival on May 19. All but the title track of these harp-accompanied verse tales commemorate a real character from Norfolk's past - from national figures like William Sawtrey of Lynn, the first man to be burned for his beliefs in England, to unsung ones like Susan Nobes of Sedgeford, killed by lightning in Sedgeford Church in 1819. As Waywood (the artists previously known as Lovehearts and Redwine), the two have written, composed, performed, recorded and produced the album themselves and will be performing them on the opening night of the Festival. Andy Wall and Gareth will close the evening with their Ely Folk Festival commission, Bread or Blood, about the Littleport and Ely Riots of 1816 and singer Sharon Clifton will commemorate Ann Boleyn (executed May 19 1536) and Margery Kempe in song .   www.buryfestival.co.uk