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The 1819 Thunderstorm

from Susan Nobes by The Penland Phezants

/

about

On July 5, 1819, a terrible thunderstorm shook Sedgeford, a small village in Norfolk, blasting a hole in the church steeple and killing 14 year old villager Susan Nobes. On the bicentenary of this tragedy, which made the Register of World News 1819-1820, The Penland Phezants recreated the storm as part of a concert at the village's archaeological dig. Unreleased until the day, the 12 minute musical thunderstorm with accounts of the tragedy and a dramatic appearance by Zeus the thunder god, blasted the village at 9 pm (the hour it began in 1819 and when Susan died.) This is the first time the full 12 minute version has been released.
See the film here- youtu.be/r9wGDw1bu8c
The Ballad of Susan Nobes here: soundcloud.com/gaz29-1/the-ballad-of-susan-nobes-performed-loveheartsredwine
Gig pic - of Gaz Phezant as Zeus the thunder god - by Bhas Allan.

lyrics

"Come the evening, folk were going about their daily tasks, working in the fields while birds sweetly sang. The teacher sat in the porch waiting for the schoolmaster to appear before Bible reading class could begin, meanwhile the attending children happily played, running up and down the churchyard, little knowing the impending doom that was to befall them. The schoolmaster duly arrived, readings began and when done was followed with a final hymn, 'Oh let me, heavenly Lord extend, My view to life's approaching end... . "(Religious tract 1819, probably by the then Curate of Sedgeford.)

"During the dreadful thunderstorm on the Evening of July 5th the electric fluid struck the top of Sedgeford Church Steeple on the West Side, and precipitated to the ground several stones of considerable magnitude making a breach in the wall of about a yard square. The lightning also passed through the Church entering in at a window near the porch on the South side; and after crossing in a North East direction, it made its escape at two places in an upper window near the Chancel on the North side". (The Times, 1819)


Zeus serves notice, via Hermes, I can mind-read his no show:
“Earth’s off axis, mind wreaks chaos, and it mocks gods’ control!!

“Man-made death-tides,winds, quakes, burn-outs, heat, light, sound – once all
Fairy-ringed, Neptune-swayed, angel-buttressed: now they blow.

“Past my epoch, my four cycles, a million years
Hurling thunderbolts and miracles (mirror-calls), I let it go.

"Gone my long reign and its vapour’s subtle shape-shifting Cloud;
Breath of God’s shadow falling as rain, my own shadow.

“King of angels, I, yet angels and gods looking down
Pray for low birth to ascend where we high spirits go.

“Man yet king god, I return to the earth as a star;
Raise the standard of what men may become, the hero.

“Man and not god, with my lightning confined in a sword,
Earthed, to die there like a man, pass the third heaven so.

“Like St Michael, ageless angel, took one lifetime as a man
To be God the day his body died, so let me below...

I embrace this girl among the lowest of the low."


Link to full words and other material here- https://garethcalway.blogspot.com/2019/04/desperately-researching-susan.html

credits

from Susan Nobes, track released July 9, 2019
Gaz voice and percussion.

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The Penland Phezants England, UK

Name inspired by Rev. Spooner, we fuse a storyteller/poet/
drummer; composer, folk guitarist/dulcimer; folk harpist/ composer;& a 4th singer (2 men/2 women) in singalong anthems for the underdog and the undersung. Hereward the Wake as European hero; rebel-mystic Margery of Lynn; Freeborn John the Civil War Radical; the Littleport Bread Rioters of 1816. Folktale/song, folk ballad, harp/spoken word ... more

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