Stories to Light the Dark

Stories to Light the Dark

This CD is currently only available as digital download here.

Tap into a deeper more ancient rhythm and revel in the realm of myth and metaphor and mysterious collection of original stories, ancestral tales and  mysterious folk ballads.

In Chaucer’s medieval  ‘The Wife of Bath’s Tale’ the question is posed ‘What is it that mortal women most desire?’ Will you agree with the answer? In ‘Mr Fox’, Mary’s golden ball and the dark Mr Fox who steals it can symbolise many things. Is he the devil or her inner critic? Will she outwit him? What will the ‘Luckless One’ discover when he goes to find the ‘Man at the End of the World Who Knows All Things’? Can you see yourself in him?

Weaving behind and between these stories and ballads are delicate medieval vocal harmonies and drones, renaissance recorders, medieval fiddle, medieval fiddle, lute, flute, lyre, concertina, harp and bells.

Most of the tracks on this album contain plots and themes specific to the adult journey. 60 minutes long.

 

Goldenheart, is an original tale of a man who finds feelings too painful. So, like Davey Jones, he throws his heart in a tin. But Goldenheart’s heart finds its way back to him. It has been the third most listened to track on one of America’s biggest storytelling sites, www.storyteller.net for years.

In The Wife of Bath’s Tale, from Chaucer’s medieval Canterbury Tales, a young knight must answer on pain of death, the question “What is it that mortal women most desire?” Will the answer he discovers save his neck? A tale of mystery, enchantment and redemption. In the chilling open-ended ballad, Mr Fox, we meet Bluebeard, or is he the devil? or is he an inner devil? Will Mary grasp her hearts desire and escape? Will we?

In King Willy, there are magical girdles and horses manes hung with silver bells offered as exchange for the birth of a beloved baby. In The Fisherman and the Baby, a freak storm separates a baby from his young father. But will a seal help?

The album has been sumptuously recorded at Nomad Digital, with meticulous attention to detail. Jenni’s beautiful vocals have a rich, warm sound and the music and sound effects that accompany the tracks greatly enhance the listener’s experience. Weaving behind and between these stories and ballads are delicate medieval vocal harmonies and drones, renaissance recorders, medieval fiddle, medieval fiddle, lute, flute, lyre, concertina, harp and bells.

Feedback:

Revered American storyteller Mary Grace Keyner said on my version of the Wife of Bath’s Tale:

“This version of “What Women Most Desire” is thrilling!
I have struggled with the elements of this story, especially Chaucer’s version which seems more flip than the King Arthur legend. In some cases I came up with the same solutions as Jenni Cargill-Strong, but she has far outshone my simple efforts in putting the whole thing into a perspective that today’s listener finds satisfying. In her telling, the year and a day of searching–even more than finding the answer–serves as restitution for his crime. Jenni’s protagonist profited from all that he learned by immersing himself in the many and varied perspectives of women and inquiring day after day, needing the guidance that only they could give. (I know some politicians I’d like to send on the same quest!) He profited first by being baffled into recognizing that his previous view of women did not reflect enduring truth, then by placing his trust in a woman who claimed she could speak for all–perhaps in desperation, but still knowing that he could not give the answer himself. (I know some politicians . . .) Guinevere seems wise indeed to have issued the year-long sentence and challenge which brought the knight full circle into a clear understanding, a transformed young man if ever there were one!

Brava, Jenni! Someone who knows her pass along my love and admiration!–Mary Grace

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