4. Hampshire

Matthew Bannister visits the village of Nether Wallop in Hampshire which was the home of Richard Pyle, a wool trader who collected music into a tune book that is kept at the Hampshire Archives in Winchester. He meets Sarah Lewin the archivist there who is also a musician with a group that reenacts historical music.

Stephen Rose from Royal Holloway University explains why the tune book is so important demonstrating that a small English country village was musically connected to places far beyond its county borders.

Nancy Kerr has created a set for her band the Melrose Quartet that explores the music in the book including a new version of what Richard Pyle calls Evening Hymn which is an arrangement of Tallis' Canon. New words draw on Nether Wallop’s location in the Test Valley, where Richard Adam’s novel Watership Down was set. The new version becomes Silverweed Hymn to Richard Pyle's canon.

Matthew Bannister has been the host of Folk on Foot, a podcast which explores folk music and its connection with landscape in the UK, since 2018 and has often wondered about where “folk music” comes from. When he heard about Nancy Kerr’s involvement in a new project, Music Heritage, Place he wanted to know more.

Royal Holloway University and Newcastle University have been sending out researchers, the “song detectorists”, to sift through the archives held in English County Record Offices looking for music. They’ve returned with musical gems that Nancy Kerr has arranged and the discoveries are offering new insights into the way music was shared and enjoyed in the past outside of the places historians and musicologists have traditionally expected to find it

Presenter: Matthew Bannister
Producer: Natalie Steed
A Rhubarb Rhubarb Production for BBC Radio 3