Higher Power

Folk icon continues to bridge the past and the present.

- Nick Dalton

Shirley Collins: her career rebirth continues on her third record in seven years

Shirley Collins 

Archangel Hill

Domino WIGLP 494 (CD, LP)

Shirley Collins is like a heroine from one of those timeless folk songs that she has been championing since the mid-50s. Graceful, intelligent and devoted, with the air of a medieval maiden as she continues her egalitarian quest to honour the toiling classes who sang the near-forgotten songs that she brings back to the world.

After a 38-year retirement, this is her third album in seven years, not bad considering she’s 87 and her first solo album emerged in 1958. It’s also the third album under the musical guidance and production of Ian Kearey, a founder of hard-hitting folkies The Oyster Band, and with The Lodestar Band, named after her 2016 return, Lodestar.

The result is a coming together of mostly old tunes with a clean, modern musical approach. Collins’ voice has an earthier tone than many will remember from the Shirley and Dolly Collins albums she made with her sister and which appeared at the start of the 70s on the Harvest label alongside Pink Floyd, Edgar Broughton and Deep Purple.

That, however, contrasts neatly with the backdrop. Kearey, as well as playing guitar, is also arranger, working alongside Collins to reinvent ancient pieces. There are memories of Fairport Convention, themselves hugely inspired by the melding of tradition and contemporary thought on Collins’ records, not least Folk Roots, New Routes, with guitarist Davey Graham.