29 f Shaped By Days
Marry Waterson & Oliver Knight have taken the family musical legacy into intriguing new realms. Colin Irwin finds out why it took as long as it did.
I
n May 2007 the clans gathered at London’s Royal Albert Hall for a remarkable concert marking the 40th anniversary of the Watersons first appearance at the old place. It was
called A Mighty River Of Song and they were all there – Mike, Norma, Eliza, Mar- tin Carthy and various other members of the extended family providing a plethora of magical moments, wonderful singing, constant banter and all. Yet the most defining moment may have come early in the second half of the show when Marry Waterson stepped forward with her brother Oliver Knight to perform one of their late mother Lal’s best-loved and most mysterious songs, Fine Horseman, from the classic Bright Phoebus album.
“Sleeping in my bed, strange thoughts are running through my head...I dreamed you were playing with my
hair...fine fine sparrow, fine fine horseman…” sang Marry and sharp intakes of breath rever- berated around Albert’s gaff, followed by the occasional sniffle. After the concert, a queue of shell-shocked well-wishers bounded up to Marry to tell her she looked and sounded exactly like Lal – like she didn’t know – and how, when she sang
that song, she’d reduced them to emo - tional wrecks. “That’s nothing,” said Marry, “how do you think I felt?”
“Oh dear, that was a tough one,” she
says now. “Tough for the family, tough for the audience who loved her and bloody tough for me. When I sing that song, I can hear my mum, she’s there with me.”
That Mighty River Of Song night at the Albert Hall proved to be a personal watershed for Marry, guiding her back to a musical path which dominated her upbringing but which she’d resisted for a long, long time. “Mum always encouraged me to sing in the car or in the house or wherever and it was always a good day when there were people in the house play- ing music,” she recalls. “I remember Jody Stecher coming over one summer and the house was full of music and we cooked these big meals and the place just lit up.”
She first joined the family business at the age of 10, appearing with the Water- sons at Durham Festival and then singing with her mum and aunt Norma on their duet album A True-Hearted Girl. This was followed by some singing on uncle Mike’s solo album and stage appearances with
the Waterdaughters (which also included cousin Eliza) with a debut in front of 35,000 people at Vancouver Folk Festival. A few cameo appearances followed and then Marry became distracted by life. Drawn to art, like her mother, she moved to Leeds to become a graphic designer, developed a passion for sculpture, mar- ried, became a mum and renovated hous- es. She renovated six houses in ten years, she says proudly. Along the way she still sang for her own pleasure and even tried writing the odd song with Lal to no avail (“All my lines were awful and hers were marvellous as usual”) but had no inclina- tion to do it any more seriously.
When Lal died so suddenly in 1998,
Marry didn’t imagine she could ever sing again, even for her own pleasure. “In the first week I listened to her music but then after about two weeks I couldn’t touch it. I couldn’t be around it and it took me nine years to get back to singing the music that had been the soundtrack to my life. Every- one was asking me to sing but I always said no but then, with the backing of the family, I felt I could sing with them at the Albert Hall. I guess the time was right.”
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