Christmas Champions

Event information

The English Folk Dance and Song Society and The Magpie's Nest Present:
Christmas Champions was originally written for BBC Radio 3's Late Junction. Now a live multimedia show has been commissioned by The Sage Gateshead and will be touring in December 2008. BBC Folk Award winning duo Chris Wood and Hugh Lupton are joined by The English Acoustic Collective and Olivia Ross in a performance that mixes the recorded voices of past generations with ritual theatre, seasonal song, storytelling and music in a celebration of England’s most enduring midwinter custom: The Mummers Play.

The show combines the music of midwinter, both choral and instrumental, with new songs and re-workings of established carols, worked into field recordings of Herbie Smith's reminiscences of mumming in the Medway valley at the turn of the last century. Hugh Lupton's narrative constantly contextualises the music and the singers reciprocate, weaving and compounding imagery, parable and drama. It is the true, native, vernacular mystery play and this performance, directed by Tim Dalling, brings it vividly to life.