Diffractions

Diffraction occurs when light spreads out as a result of passing across an edge or through a small space. Ollie King holds that the same process applies to traditional music, with the musician being the edge or aperture who leaves their individual mark on every song or tune they play, thus broadening and diversifying the music. The album opens with two great hymn tunes, Haydn's ‘Austria’ and ‘Thaxted’ by Gustav Holst. King's melodeon hints at a church organ, but is far less triumphalist in its sound. King is fascinated by the meeting of classical with traditional music. ‘Hornpipes’ features one from Handel's Water Music, and a tune known as ‘The Hole in the Wall’, which Purcell used. He follows Vaughan Williams's score of ‘Linden Lea’, and in ‘Roses’ he includes what seems to be the only surviving composition by the great music collector Cecil Sharp. Even Arthur Sullivan (as in ‘Gilbert and’) gets a look in.

King has very good taste, and leaves his mark on two terrific songs, ‘Ruins by the Shore’ by Nic Jones and ‘Winifred Odd’, in which Lal Waterson captures an entire eccentric, lonely life in a few verses. A master of the melodeon, King also plays a mean electric guitar. He is joined by singer Rosie Hood, Tom Wright on bass and Al Simpson on trombone. With folk, classical, brass band and even a hint of jazz, Diffractions is powerful proof of King's theory.