1 00:00:18,370 --> 00:00:28,990 I'm Faye Hield, and I'm Caroline Larrington. This is episode two in the second Modern Fairies and Loathley Ladies podcast series, Fairy Time and Space. 2 00:00:28,990 --> 00:00:35,730 And this seemed to be the topic that really sees the artist's imaginations most, don't you think? 3 00:00:35,730 --> 00:00:38,710 I'm partly perhaps because it was just so open ended. 4 00:00:38,710 --> 00:00:45,130 I think the musicians really, really went to town with this one, with the space and the timings of music and the ideas. 5 00:00:45,130 --> 00:00:50,380 We were talking a lot about belief and what fairies meant and what the magic was. 6 00:00:50,380 --> 00:00:55,330 And there was a lot about when you've undergone a fairy encounter, how it changes the person. 7 00:00:55,330 --> 00:01:02,860 So I think that's the bit that struck the artists. How do you make somebody feel in a really visceral experience? 8 00:01:02,860 --> 00:01:13,810 And music seemed a very key part of that. Yeah. And the stories suggest that the world of the fairies is a world that is very much parallel to ours. 9 00:01:13,810 --> 00:01:19,270 It's one that you can enter through all worlds at very subtle points where the 10 00:01:19,270 --> 00:01:23,440 two worlds kind of touch each other and the worlds are going on in parallel. 11 00:01:23,440 --> 00:01:29,020 And one of the themes that really came up quite a lot in the course of the project was the sense of the fairies, 12 00:01:29,020 --> 00:01:36,210 the thing you can just see out of the corner of your eyes sometimes. And that's when you have a sense of what the unseen space is. 13 00:01:36,210 --> 00:01:44,410 But it was also quite important in the stories that once you slide into that other world, time moves very differently. 14 00:01:44,410 --> 00:01:48,850 Definitely. So they were trying to represent that from the stories. 15 00:01:48,850 --> 00:01:56,170 But I think they were also trying to find a way for us to do it, to experience it and to create a gateway into fairy. 16 00:01:56,170 --> 00:02:00,910 Not just not just representing it or show it, but to make it. 17 00:02:00,910 --> 00:02:05,990 So let's talk now about some of the things that the artists actually produced here. 18 00:02:05,990 --> 00:02:14,290 And let's start with parallel worlds. Jim's extraordinary film to which Bonnie produced that great cello music. 19 00:02:14,290 --> 00:02:17,230 So I think the music came first. 20 00:02:17,230 --> 00:02:26,020 Bonnie was playing with the idea of what it's like to see things from the corner of your eye or to hear footsteps on the edges of your sound. 21 00:02:26,020 --> 00:02:28,390 But when you turned to look that they've gone, 22 00:02:28,390 --> 00:02:34,150 the idea that there is this parallel world that we can glimpse and sense but can't completely grab a hold of. 23 00:02:34,150 --> 00:02:41,470 And so he played with cello through electronic manipulation to create this sonic world, 24 00:02:41,470 --> 00:02:46,420 positioning the listener within their sonic landscape, which is inaccessible. 25 00:02:46,420 --> 00:06:22,130 Let's hear some upon his music now, then. So that was Barney Moore sprains cello piece. 26 00:06:22,130 --> 00:06:33,320 Parallel worlds. And when Jim was thinking about his part in the project, not just recording the performance in the sharing in the seat, 27 00:06:33,320 --> 00:06:37,820 but actually his own creative work, he got a bit stuck, didn't he? 28 00:06:37,820 --> 00:06:43,160 I think he found the whole idea of fairies rather peculiar. He found it very difficult. 29 00:06:43,160 --> 00:06:50,840 So in those early days, we had this discussion about where we stood on the belief, the spectrum of fairies. 30 00:06:50,840 --> 00:06:55,900 And Jim was firmly on the edge of, oh, my God, I'm locked in a room full of weirdos. 31 00:06:55,900 --> 00:07:01,670 And he I think ecstatically he really struggled as to what he would be able to produce, 32 00:07:01,670 --> 00:07:11,810 that he would stand by as an artist and be proud of within this topic that he found quite ridiculous and quite weird. 33 00:07:11,810 --> 00:07:16,100 But in the end, he latched on to the tale of a little. 34 00:07:16,100 --> 00:07:19,610 And that's something that we talked about in the last series. 35 00:07:19,610 --> 00:07:25,580 It was interesting with all the artists, you could see a moment where the penny dropped or the switch clicked or something, 36 00:07:25,580 --> 00:07:30,980 and they they actually found something that resonated with them in the stories. 37 00:07:30,980 --> 00:07:33,860 And yet that moment happened with Jim. 38 00:07:33,860 --> 00:07:42,440 With that tale and also hearing Barney's work, which is incredibly contemporary and feel maybe we can give you some sense of what was in the film, 39 00:07:42,440 --> 00:07:47,120 even though it's not as good seeing the film itself on The Modern Fairy, its website. 40 00:07:47,120 --> 00:07:59,510 So Jim starts with this room of very stark, architecturally minimalist space with lots of rectangles and playing grey walls and a child around, 41 00:07:59,510 --> 00:08:10,790 I don't know, eight to 10, maybe sitting on a chair staring at this blank wall, then using some new fancy, incredibly exciting video technology. 42 00:08:10,790 --> 00:08:20,930 Jim creates a weird black shape that is represents this portal that the child is fascinated by and walks up to and tries to explore. 43 00:08:20,930 --> 00:08:29,510 It is so moving incredibly slowly. You get a sense of trying to feel what the child must be experiencing from this very lack of sensory 44 00:08:29,510 --> 00:08:37,070 data in this room to facing this bizarre thing of the way this kind of pulses and its black, 45 00:08:37,070 --> 00:08:41,100 its gleaming, it's like kind of tangled knot, but it's also sort of very dense. 46 00:08:41,100 --> 00:08:51,320 And then you can see how it it pulls the boy in. So he walks all the way down that long space up to where this strange, pulsating painting is. 47 00:08:51,320 --> 00:09:02,690 And then something happens and becomes transported into a world of nature and beauty and sunshine and a hazy summer day, idyllic environment. 48 00:09:02,690 --> 00:09:07,010 Yes, he's in a woodland and he's with somebody who looks very much like him. 49 00:09:07,010 --> 00:09:11,690 It's as if he's met his double, though. In fact, it's actually his brother. 50 00:09:11,690 --> 00:09:20,060 And there's a very strange late afternoon kind of light that they're walking along with the light slanting through the trees by hedgerow. 51 00:09:20,060 --> 00:09:26,870 And one boy has his arm running out the one's neck and everything looks wonderful and kind of timelessly beautiful. 52 00:09:26,870 --> 00:09:32,870 How does this fit with the story of at all? Well, in it all, the boy gets shut out forever. 53 00:09:32,870 --> 00:09:37,850 When the portal closes, well, what's happening in this film is that back in that hole, 54 00:09:37,850 --> 00:09:43,190 back in that kind of gallery space, that twisty painting, it's gradually shrinking. 55 00:09:43,190 --> 00:09:47,480 It's losing its design and then eventually it becomes blank. 56 00:09:47,480 --> 00:09:52,760 So the portal to the other world has closed. And the boy can't ever get back. 57 00:09:52,760 --> 00:09:59,900 Very enigmatic isn't enough. I think that's that's not a narrative that you can just tell the story of the video. 58 00:09:59,900 --> 00:10:03,860 You could make your own meanings out of the film and where you sit with it. 59 00:10:03,860 --> 00:10:12,800 Is it that the child has been released from a world of blindness into its idyllic haven and reunited with a happier self? 60 00:10:12,800 --> 00:10:17,000 Or is it that it's been lured into a magical world through the promise of 61 00:10:17,000 --> 00:10:22,220 mystery and beauty and is then trapped to not able to return to the real world? 62 00:10:22,220 --> 00:10:24,530 Maybe he doesn't want to come back. 63 00:10:24,530 --> 00:10:33,200 But I think there's something about the way the camera's position that and also our knowledge on the project that the two boys are Jim Zohn, 64 00:10:33,200 --> 00:10:38,180 two sons, that the camera and Jim then remain outside. 65 00:10:38,180 --> 00:10:42,350 And the children have vanished into this world, perhaps forever. 66 00:10:42,350 --> 00:10:51,110 And there's certainly something about being a father and seeing your children in the innocence and beauty of childhood in childhood that 67 00:10:51,110 --> 00:10:59,990 sort of characterised by that summer afternoon light and maybe having a sense that that's not a stage in human life that can last forever. 68 00:10:59,990 --> 00:11:08,630 But it does. I think this film gave us a very strong sense that there is another place and maybe even a better place that we can't quite see. 69 00:11:08,630 --> 00:11:14,690 And it's a nostalgic world of childhood innocence, maybe, that we get kind of shut out of. 70 00:11:14,690 --> 00:11:19,160 You don't have to go through a magic portal in a mysterious. Gallery to reach share of the wealth. 71 00:11:19,160 --> 00:11:23,760 And at times you can be aware that it is always there just hovering at the edge of your vision. 72 00:11:23,760 --> 00:11:29,640 Ewan was inspired by a photograph that he took on a sleeper train going up to Scotland. 73 00:11:29,640 --> 00:11:34,680 He was looking across at his companion in late slanting afternoon light, 74 00:11:34,680 --> 00:11:40,560 and suddenly her shadow looked like a weird human figure in silhouette with an oddly pointed nose. 75 00:11:40,560 --> 00:11:46,530 Very different from her. And he had this strange sense that the person that he thought he knew wasn't familiar 76 00:11:46,530 --> 00:11:51,540 at all and that the shadow was slipping away somewhere else into another space. 77 00:11:51,540 --> 00:12:15,810 And he composed this song, Sleeper. Summer sleep. 78 00:12:15,810 --> 00:12:22,650 Echoes from the higher Webberley. 79 00:12:22,650 --> 00:12:51,100 Link us with catching the train and is on this. 80 00:12:51,100 --> 00:13:05,580 Ice and sea ice. 81 00:13:05,580 --> 00:13:17,780 As the day. And this was shed. 82 00:13:17,780 --> 00:13:30,650 And Santos. Just like. 83 00:13:30,650 --> 00:14:03,700 Dusky size and strength, that means. 84 00:14:03,700 --> 00:14:20,170 Flowing. And dusty, slightly stretch, sleepy stretch. 85 00:14:20,170 --> 00:14:28,400 Break away. Smell. 86 00:14:28,400 --> 00:15:00,150 Send. Nazi ice. 87 00:15:00,150 --> 00:15:22,050 Shoot, shoot, beat ya, slay the trees, no crazy. 88 00:15:22,050 --> 00:16:00,970 Go on. They don't happen, such as Don. 89 00:16:00,970 --> 00:16:03,790 Marri loves traditional stories. 90 00:16:03,790 --> 00:16:10,930 And one of the tales that particularly caught her imagination was the tale of King Hayler King Hayler with the legendary 91 00:16:10,930 --> 00:16:18,010 king who went on a visit to the world of the fairies and found that he'd stayed there for 300 years on leaving. 92 00:16:18,010 --> 00:16:21,910 He was given the present political talk and was told he could dismount from his 93 00:16:21,910 --> 00:16:27,030 horse only when the dog jumped down from the horse and he hasn't jumped down yet. 94 00:16:27,030 --> 00:16:32,400 So Hala and his men and their horses and dogs are still riding. 95 00:16:32,400 --> 00:16:38,170 The king hurlers caught in space. There is no space and he's got to keep moving. 96 00:16:38,170 --> 00:16:43,870 But he also moves in a different and internal time, sometimes connected with the wild hunt. 97 00:16:43,870 --> 00:16:49,570 Man horses and dogs that rampaged through the skies, particularly when there's crisis. 98 00:16:49,570 --> 00:16:54,130 It's part of a larger musical project on hurler that Barry began to work on. 99 00:16:54,130 --> 00:16:59,920 And she connected the journeying to the Gabrial hounds as they called in her part of Yorkshire. 100 00:16:59,920 --> 00:18:05,140 A pack of phantom dogs heard barking in the sky. A sign of ill omen. 101 00:18:05,140 --> 00:18:20,220 Could midnight Lisa swanned and less lonely walks on Chernow's moons. 102 00:18:20,220 --> 00:18:27,000 Sky No storms in the winter. 103 00:18:27,000 --> 00:18:31,610 Seven wiseness. And this goes to nose. 104 00:18:31,610 --> 00:18:46,410 No swatting flies. So huge. 105 00:18:46,410 --> 00:18:55,460 Was this. So. 106 00:18:55,460 --> 00:19:16,500 Doomed to a. Try this. 107 00:19:16,500 --> 00:19:20,090 And like hurlers little dog that still hasn't jumped down. 108 00:19:20,090 --> 00:19:25,550 That's a very dark idea of being stuck in a place where there's no rest, no way out. 109 00:19:25,550 --> 00:19:32,910 And there's the pack of dogs that are accompanying you through the night. Similarly to Barney's playing with space and sound, 110 00:19:32,910 --> 00:19:39,870 Ingar created some music that opens up possibilities of moving into a different, unseen dimension through music. 111 00:19:39,870 --> 00:20:10,560 She stretched sound, speed and time up and slowing it down, given the listener a visceral sensation of being moved in a piece called Tieing Squint. 112 00:20:10,560 --> 00:22:56,560 Susan. Not destroying the natural habitat. 113 00:22:56,560 --> 00:23:04,870 Way you've been always interested in how to make mediƦval stories into new songs, and one of your earlier songs was Sir Orfeo, 114 00:23:04,870 --> 00:23:10,630 A Tale of a Woman Snatched Away by the King of the Fairies and how her husband got her back. 115 00:23:10,630 --> 00:23:19,180 And in some ways, that was a kind of forerunner to this project. But still thinking about the way in which the fairy world can erupt into this one. 116 00:23:19,180 --> 00:23:24,670 You turn another mediaeval romance into a song. So the knight meets his very mischiefs. 117 00:23:24,670 --> 00:23:33,250 But when he breaks the taboo that he must never, ever speak of her, she vanishes and he is in real danger of being executed for insulting the queen. 118 00:23:33,250 --> 00:23:39,670 And the poem opens up the question of whether the fairy lover can ever forgive him and whether she'll come back to save him. 119 00:23:39,670 --> 00:23:45,040 So what made you decide to make a new song out of this very long romance, Faith? 120 00:23:45,040 --> 00:23:49,740 Well, we were looking at that initial set of materials. It really struck me. 121 00:23:49,740 --> 00:23:57,640 There's this huge rich seam of stories that and how few with them actually moved over into the traditional music realm. 122 00:23:57,640 --> 00:24:02,440 And I thought, you know, there's been some amazing contemporary music being made here, 123 00:24:02,440 --> 00:24:07,510 some really experimental sounds and some very modern interpretations of these stories. 124 00:24:07,510 --> 00:24:17,230 But my background is in traditional music. And I I was interested in the idea of trying to create a fake focus on, I suppose is one way to put it, 125 00:24:17,230 --> 00:24:23,860 but to create singable ballads out of this material in quite a traditional forms. 126 00:24:23,860 --> 00:24:30,280 I just went for one of the big stories and set myself the task of getting my head around it and making it smaller. 127 00:24:30,280 --> 00:24:38,890 I picked this song So Long Fall and I kind of had a vague gist of what it was about, but I didn't have a deep relationship with it. 128 00:24:38,890 --> 00:24:43,810 And part of the whole process of turning into a song was to develop that relationship and realise what it 129 00:24:43,810 --> 00:24:51,040 is in the song that needs to be kept and preserved and how you distil that into something that singable. 130 00:24:51,040 --> 00:25:02,080 This was a six thousand word story written in middle English, and it ended up as a 800 plus word song. 131 00:25:02,080 --> 00:25:04,780 So it had to be really reduced down, 132 00:25:04,780 --> 00:25:13,210 but and translated as well into something that I could understand and wasn't just a case of reducing everything equally. 133 00:25:13,210 --> 00:25:17,920 It was a case of finding the strands of passion in the song and trying to develop 134 00:25:17,920 --> 00:25:22,120 a new narrative or decide what the narrative was and build it up from there. 135 00:25:22,120 --> 00:25:29,170 So the whole process of reducing it down took several layers, acknowledging what I was doing at different points as well. 136 00:25:29,170 --> 00:25:36,690 It's a really fascinating process to undertake, actually. And what did you think in the end was the most important thing about the song? 137 00:25:36,690 --> 00:25:41,170 What did what? Could you not get rid of it? Well, there were some things that confused me in it. 138 00:25:41,170 --> 00:25:48,490 So you've got this knight who's very loyal and generous and an all around good egg and you got this fairy who loves him. 139 00:25:48,490 --> 00:25:53,020 And then he is seduced by the queen, but he turns her down. 140 00:25:53,020 --> 00:25:56,800 And in his defence, he says, well, I love this other woman. 141 00:25:56,800 --> 00:26:02,560 He was supposed to not tell anybody that this other woman existed. So he defied the fairies. 142 00:26:02,560 --> 00:26:08,410 And in fairy lore, you're not supposed to go against what fairy soldiers to do or you will be punished. 143 00:26:08,410 --> 00:26:16,900 And he is punished. He loses all his bicycle that he's been given and he doesn't see his true love that in the end he's going to be home for this. 144 00:26:16,900 --> 00:26:18,580 But he hasn't actually done anything wrong. 145 00:26:18,580 --> 00:26:27,320 He was using it in defence of his morality rather than for personal gain, although it was going to gain is keeping his head, I suppose. 146 00:26:27,320 --> 00:26:34,600 So it took me a while to work out how to excuse the way it goes against what is supposed to happen with fairies. 147 00:26:34,600 --> 00:26:41,530 Again, like the calling on song to soften off the edges and every line, I think in a song has to make sense to you. 148 00:26:41,530 --> 00:26:47,350 Otherwise, you're going through the motions. And yet the story really, really distilled down something that made sense. 149 00:26:47,350 --> 00:26:54,330 So the key themes for me were about loyalty and trust and honesty and dignity and integrity, 150 00:26:54,330 --> 00:27:01,070 and that those things ultimately are rewarded and recognised. Should we hear some of the song now? 151 00:27:01,070 --> 00:27:07,160 So long ball he was. I guess so. 152 00:27:07,160 --> 00:27:22,670 So they're sending Broi to Squires and loads the game so free when a long ball had his father passed him by as he rode straight home to help. 153 00:27:22,670 --> 00:27:32,550 And by sharing his wealth most generously, he gave so free. 154 00:27:32,550 --> 00:27:40,970 He Rubin, as Paul Noble brought with his pride. 155 00:27:40,970 --> 00:27:49,190 He rode away, worn, rigid and cried and saw Rose soar in the shade of a tree. 156 00:27:49,190 --> 00:28:00,380 He turned in the halls hole where he found pure. 157 00:28:00,380 --> 00:28:06,290 She lay like fresh, fallen snow on a cold winter's day. 158 00:28:06,290 --> 00:28:23,020 She grows red. Eyes glass shong grey. She said long ball, but I kind hearted love all the notes that you play so you can see why you're okay. 159 00:28:23,020 --> 00:28:34,000 La la, la, la. I should be tired. Always want to buy it here by your side profile or June choppering. 160 00:28:34,000 --> 00:28:43,440 Oh, she's so kind. Oh, let's see. 161 00:28:43,440 --> 00:28:48,410 Shall I see. But make not the most rewarding. 162 00:28:48,410 --> 00:28:56,850 Oh my baby. Oh most. They wear this sports. 163 00:28:56,850 --> 00:29:05,820 Why is this great state. That so. 164 00:29:05,820 --> 00:29:21,740 Well, parole to a man strolls. At the end of the song Long Island, his lady banished to the ferry will not ever to be seen again at this point. 165 00:29:21,740 --> 00:29:31,040 So a bit like in Jim's film, the ferry world may be a better place where you can find a kind of enduring happiness. 166 00:29:31,040 --> 00:29:38,870 And you can escape from all the mess and corruption of this world. And indeed, you get away from the effects of time. 167 00:29:38,870 --> 00:29:46,160 So in some ways, questions about time and space were easier for the musicians to seise on their imaginations were 168 00:29:46,160 --> 00:29:51,050 given lots of scope when they tell us about these huge concepts that are hard to put into words, 169 00:29:51,050 --> 00:29:54,620 but maybe they're somehow easier to express in music. 170 00:29:54,620 --> 00:30:02,020 Music strongly linked to Time's sound passes through time in a way that visual images or the written word doesn't really evoke. 171 00:30:02,020 --> 00:30:05,710 And musicians are aware of time in their playing very heavily. 172 00:30:05,710 --> 00:30:12,770 And I think the ability for different sounds to change how that time is perceived is something on the periphery of every musician's conception, 173 00:30:12,770 --> 00:30:20,180 whatever work they're producing. But placing it centre stage like Ingram Barny have done here is really interesting. 174 00:30:20,180 --> 00:30:22,520 There's also the visceral physical element. 175 00:30:22,520 --> 00:30:28,620 In the early days we were talking about how we wanted the audience to undergo a transformation and to have a physical change. 176 00:30:28,620 --> 00:30:36,860 And I think the absence of literal words or imagery, the more abstract use of sound, can connect with those deeper senses in an audience. 177 00:30:36,860 --> 00:30:43,130 The stories are wonderful and the words make us think in new ways. But I think the music helps us feel in new ways. 178 00:30:43,130 --> 00:30:48,290 Marion Banas treatment of her life, I think especially manages to do both. 179 00:30:48,290 --> 00:30:54,800 So in the next pope costs, we'll be looking at some more unsettling material from the modern ferret's project. 180 00:30:54,800 --> 00:30:59,920 The theme of what happens when fairies and children come into contact with one another. 181 00:30:59,920 --> 00:31:04,050 Yes, and dangerous and strange stuff. In the next episode. 182 00:31:04,050 --> 00:31:08,660 So do have a listen. And don't forget to take a look at the Modern Fairies Web site, 183 00:31:08,660 --> 00:31:11,960 where you can find more of our work with illustrations and a film with a 184 00:31:11,960 --> 00:31:30,221 performance with lots of interesting blog posts from our office about the process.