Songs of Thomas Hardy's Wessex
This is a comprehensive collection of the songs of Hardy's Wessex characters.
The versions of the songs are from sources as close as possible in time and place to Hardy's homeland, many coming from the folk-song collector H.E.D. Hammond, who collected traditional songs in Dorset in the early years of this century, frequently from people of Hardy's generation. As far as possible, a single source has been used for each song, collating other versions only when the source is incomplete or to incorporate the words as Hardy quotes them.
The songs omitted are the Irish and Scottish songs, one or two literary and art-music pieces which were never part of a singing tradition, military songs, and untraceable fragments. With a few exceptions, Hardy's characters sing unaccompanied, as is usual with traditional English singers. Varying degrees of accompaniment are used here, reflecting the musical culture Hardy knew as a boy and often writes about. Fiddle and cello were his family's instruments, and his characters also play flutes and oboes, whilst he himself played some sort of concertina or accordion when very young. The vox humana was the English version of the baroque tenor oboe, created and sold primarily for use in Church bands and also used in military wind bands. The instrument heard on this album was made by DonaldS.
Gill in 1994 and is a replica of an instrument by Thomas Collier of London, c. 1770, now in the Edinburgh University Collection.
Dave Townsend, 1994
（アルバムのライナー解説より抜粋）