Three Songs from ‘Springlines’

Composer Hugh Morris was commissioned by The Ludlow English Song Weekend to set three of Clare’s Springlines poems, and the piece was performed at St Laurence’s Church, Ludlow on 30 October 2021, by mezzo-soprano Emma Roberts, accompanied on the piano by Gamal Khamis.

Listen to the live recording:

Flame Robin

A collaboration with composer Alex Mills. More here…

Geological Section

A collaboration with composer Michael Bascom, who set this poem:

Geological section

Draw an imaginary line from Wellington Rocks at 410 ft above sea level (Lower Tunbridge Wells Sandstone over Wadhurst Clay) to Rumbers Hill at 489 ft above sea level (Ashdown Sand). The spring rises almost exactly halfway along this line.

In the fine-grained sand of the faulted valley
the chalybeate spring keeps rising
through layers of mottled clay

with seams of ironstone (siderite or chalybite)
weathering to heavy soil, starved of lime,
oozing rusty ferrous water.

Rain falls on this ground,
seeps downdip, gathering in the hollow
floored by Wadhurst Clay. The spring rises

where the water table meets the surface

floored by Wadhurst Clay. The spring rises,
seeps downdip, gathering in the hollow.
Rain falls on this ground

oozing rusty ferrous water,
weathering to heavy soil starved of lime
with seams of ironstone (siderite or chalybite).

Through layers of mottled clay
the chalybeate spring keeps rising
in the fine-grained sand of the faulted valley.