Shirley Collins releases new song "Hares On The Mountain"
Photo credit: Grant Gee

Shirley Collins releases new song "Hares On The Mountain"

Ahead of the release of Archangel Hill, Shirley Collins’ third album for Domino (due May 26th), she is please to share a second track from the record, “Hares On The Mountain”.

This is the third time Collins has recorded the folk song, she says: “I’ve recorded this twice before: once a rather trivial version collected by Ralph Vaughan Williams; the second time I rewrote the melody and recorded it with Davy Graham in 1965. This time I was looking to bring out the mysterious and wry quality that lies underneath.”

After decades of stewardship, Shirley Collins allows us to discover once more her timeless classic “Hares On The Mountain”, a song she defined as a young woman but when re-sung on Archangel Hill, re-emerges aching with the wisdom of the archetypes she has at many points in her life embodied; mother, muse, dreamer, explorer, samaritan, elder, rebel and sage... Every one of these shades of Shirley has affected the tending with which we now receive this last harvest and the tenderness we hear within songs, sung like only Shirley can. It only takes a heartbreak to sing a love song but a lifetime to sing a folk song.

Upcoming live date
21st May – Brighton Festival @ Brighton Dome, Brighton 

Shirley Collins Archangel Hill

Album | 26th May 2023

One of the most important voices in British folk music Shirley Collins returns with Archangel Hill, her third album for Domino. Due for release on May 26th, it showcases another peerless collection of songs chosen by Collins, some from traditional sources but others from favourite writers of hers.  

Produced by Ian Kearey - Shirley Collins’ musical director - the arrangements were shared between Collins, Kearey, Pip Barnes, as well as Dave Arthur and Pete Cooper, players from The Lodestar Band.  

All of the songs on Archangel Hill were recorded last year except for “Hand And Heart”, which was taken from a live performance at the Sydney Opera House in 1980 and features an arrangement by Shirley’s beloved and talented sister Dolly Collins.  

Tracklisting

  • 1Fare Thee Well My Dearest Dear
  • 2Lost in a Wood
  • 3The Captain with the Whiskers
  • 4June Apple
  • 5The Golden Glove
  • 6High and Away
  • 7Oakham Poachers
  • 8Hares on the Mountain
  • 9Hand and Heart
  • 10The Bonny Labouring Boy
  • 11Swaggering Boney
  • 12How Far is it to Bethlehem?
  • 13Archangel Hill

Shirley Collins Archangel Hill

Album | 26th May 2023

One of the most important voices in British folk music Shirley Collins returns with Archangel Hill, her third album for Domino. Due for release on May 26th, it showcases another peerless collection of songs chosen by Collins, some from traditional sources but others from favourite writers of hers.  

Produced by Ian Kearey - Shirley Collins’ musical director - the arrangements were shared between Collins, Kearey, Pip Barnes, as well as Dave Arthur and Pete Cooper, players from The Lodestar Band.  

All of the songs on Archangel Hill were recorded last year except for “Hand And Heart”, which was taken from a live performance at the Sydney Opera House in 1980 and features an arrangement by Shirley’s beloved and talented sister Dolly Collins.  

Tracklisting

  • 1Fare Thee Well My Dearest Dear
  • 2Lost in a Wood
  • 3The Captain with the Whiskers
  • 4June Apple
  • 5The Golden Glove
  • 6High and Away
  • 7Oakham Poachers
  • 8Hares on the Mountain
  • 9Hand and Heart
  • 10The Bonny Labouring Boy
  • 11Swaggering Boney
  • 12How Far is it to Bethlehem?
  • 13Archangel Hill
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