Ancient Rivals

The third song in Lisa Fitzgibbon’s Down in the Valley – Songs of Landscape and Legend song cycle is ‘Ancient Rivals’.

Inspired by the story of the two Grannies in Laurie Lee’s book ‘Cider with Rosie’. Grannie Trill (Er-up-Atop) and Grannie Wallen (Er-Down-Under) were two formidable characters. They lived above and below each other in the T section of Lee’s childhood home in Slad, and were ‘rival ancients’. Lee writes ‘their perpetual enmity was like mice in the walls’.

They would visit Grannie Wallen’s kitchen and Grannie Trills cavernous rooms full of trinkets and treasures. The Grannies lives, stories and legends fed the imagination of the the young Laurie Lee and the children of Slad.

Follow Lisa as she writes six songs inspired by the book ‘Cider with Rosie’ and the beautiful Slad Valley, in the Cotswolds. The prose and poetry of local author Laurie Lee influences these songs of landscape and legend.