Darren Hayman is back, with a second volume of songs resulting from his Thankful Villages project. The seventh village is Shapwick, Somerset.

Video shot by Imogen Giffiths

There’s a few Shapwicks. I got myself into a muddle. I was nearly booked to play the Shapwick village fete before realising it was the wrong Shapwick.

There’s more than a few Mistletoe Brides as well. It’s a folk tale that travels around and a few places lay claim to the story.

Folk tales float like leaves on a breeze. They land wherever they find plausibility.

There is a manor in Shapwick at least, as there was in the story.

We found leaves pinned onto truncated trees with different coloured drawing pins. Why would someone pin leaves to a tree trunk? What would they be doing?

I wrote a song at the top of some stairs leading to a back entrance to the church. It was summer; Christmas was a long way away. I was a long way from home.

I floated into Shapwick on a breeze. I pinned a story to it. I drifted out again.

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Thankful Villages Vol.2 is out now on Rivertones. You can buy a copy here, or listen on Spotify.

Previous Thankful Villages posts on Caught by the River/ Darren Hayman on Twitter