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By Castle Walls - © P Goodrich 2019
"When Summer sun shines on your face
By Castle Walls I feel your grace
When bees alight on golden thrones
By Castle Walls 'twixt sea and stone"
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The Gertrude Jekyll garden, near to Lindisfarne Castle is the focus of this track. Now owned by the National Trust, originally it was a walled garden that was first constructed by troops manning the castle, presumably as far back as the 1500s or 1600s, to grow food.
In 1902, the Country Life magazine founder and owner Edward Hudson took out a lease from the Crown on Lindisfarne Castle and commissioned his friend, the architect Edwin Lutyens, to transform the Castle into a holiday home in which Hudson could entertain during his summer visits.
In 1911, Hudson decided to restore the old walled garden to use as a place to enjoy. Lutyens brought in his regular collaborator, Gertrude Jekyll to undertake the design work
This track is now part of "The Pilgrims Way Project" exploring the history and natural world of Lindisfarne.
Project Playlist
soundcloud.com/mrbouzouki/sets/the-pilgrims-way-project
Project Website
https://www.pilgrims-way.co.uk
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Instrumentation
By Castle Walls instrumental feature strings, cello, alto flute, alto F low whistle, english horn, piano, harp, alto glockenspiel, bass guitar, harpsichord and a mixed choir backing. It also features my initial poem voice-over and 'bees ensemble' :-)
The buzzing bees sound FX is classed as Public Domain and is used to add colour to the track from www.freesound.org
creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/
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Background
In my head I had the idea of trying to capture the feeling of guests of Hudson, (or modern day visitors) walking around the garden on a late Summer afternoon, possibly stopping to listen to the bees, busy at work, collecting honey.
The poem came out of that thought which then inspired the musical direction of the piece.
I imagined the first part, idyllic, tranquil, moving to section where you just focus in on the bees and everyday life slips away for a while. This is followed by a grander 'promenade ending', where I imagined Hudson's guests strolling around in the late afternoon sun.
- Genre
- The Pilgrims Way Project