Page 111 - Aldeburgh Festival 2022 FINAL COVERAGE BOOK

The Faerie Bride is about compromise and respect in relationships, about understanding and accepting people
as they are and not trying to change their nature. It’s about suspicion and fear of the outsider, and the societal
pressures to conform in insular communities, something this faerie refuses to do.

But it’s also about the acceptance of death. At the end of the cantata The Women slips quietly back into the lake
— "she was there, and then not there. Here, and then not here" — and ultimately The Man is left alone with his
grief, hopelessly returning to the lake each day in the hope of catching a glimpse of her in the water, unable to
let go.

As I write this my wonderful grandmother, Margaret, has just passed away. Growing up I always suspected there
was something other-worldly about her. She was born not in a lake but in a forest. She would recite poems in a
strange old language — Wully yudded varest zhip, thee ‘as more roits than oiy. Thoi c’ust wander where thy
please, where’st oiy must walk on boiy. She would take handkerchiefs in her hands and dance around to brass
band music. Like a leprechaun she could magic money from thin air. She was impish and mischievous and, like
the faerie of our tale, she refused to conform; she was wild and impossible to catch.

She and my grandfather were together for nearly 70 years and in that time they never spent a single day apart.
Her final days were full of love as he sat by her side stroking her face and combing her hair, trying to come to
terms with the fact she would soon leave him forever. Despite her deterioration my granddad still believed she
was a "strong woman" and might just pull through and get better. It was heart-breaking and desperately sad, but
also the most beautiful thing; how many people can say they they’ve given a lifetime to someone? But coming to
terms with that kind of loss is almost inconceivable. The passing of my strange and wondrous nan has made our
world a little less colourful, but the stories we tell of her are recited in technicolor.