Yorkshire Through The Ages II

This is the second volume of Tim’s musical tour of England’s largest county, Yorkshire and its History and Culture.
This collection features 12 songs covering many people, places and events from the 4th to the 19th centuries.

The album starts off ‘Moorland Drifters’, a song inspired by ‘Heathcliffe and Cathy’ from ‘Wuthering Heights’ written by Yorkshire novelist Emily Bronte.

Then we have 3 songs about the development of Christianity in the region:

‘Constantine’ - about the Roman Emperor who took the throne while in York in AD 306 and later converted to Christianity and effectively established the Roman Catholic Church. (The cover of 'Yorkshire Through The Ages II' is, in fact, a picture of a statue of Constantine situated in front of York Minster).
‘A Woodland Prayer’ – inspired by the 13th century Hermit and Saint, St Robert of Knaresborough
‘St Hilda of Whitby’ – about the pioneering 7th century Abbess who helped found English Christianity

Then there are four songs about famous people and places from the historic town of Knaresborough, probably the most important town in Northern England in the earlier part of the last millennium:

'Castle On The Crag' Knaresborough famous 12th Century castle where King John spent a lot of his time.
'Mother Shipton' the legendary 16th century Knaresborough prophetess
'Blind Jack' about the pioneering 18th century Knaresborough Road Builder
'House Of Rock' about a distinctive house carved out of the rock face on a crag in the 18th century in Knaresborough

These are followed by two songs about 2 distant countries ‘down under’ with which Yorkshire has a strong connection through North Yorkshire’s famous 18th century explorer Captain James Cook.

‘Let Peace Prevail in New Zealand’ about how Cook established friendly trade between his crew and the Maoris. He sings a song of hope for a long-lasting, mutually beneficial relationship between the British and the natives.

‘Australia (Land Of Opportunity)’ – a song about when Cook dropped anchor in Botany Bay, and naturalist Joseph Banks and a helper go ashore and return with exotic plants and flowers.

As with YTTA volume 1, we finish with songs about 19th Century fantasy, imagination and the industrial revolution.

A song inspired by one of the poems of Charles Dodgson (aka Lewis Carroll) a North Yorkshire resident and frequent visitor to Whitby.

‘Captains Of Industry’ about the 19th Century Benevolent Capitalism pioneered by two famous Yorkshire Industrialists: Titus Salt (of Saltaire) and Joseph Rowntree (of York).