Derbyshire folk singer Lucy Ward's new collaborative album with Icelandic and Canadian award-winners

In their own musical micro NATO alliance, Lucy joined forces with Iceland’s modern-day troubadour Svavar Knútur and Canada’s Adyn Townes, purveyor of pin-sharp, heartfelt songs.

The contrasting singer-songwriters, who have a dozen albums between them and a plethora of industry awards and nominations, were propelled together through the world’s largest musical collaboration Global Music Match - a ground-breaking project which saw 60 artists from 16 countries making music virtually with counterparts.Ward, Knútur and Townes teamed up through Covid lockdowns, melding their songwriting skills and seemingly made-to-be harmonies, literally finding their sound as the world fell silent. Such was their rapport they agreed it shouldn’t end there and decided to pursue a debut album.

Having painstakingly crafted the album over two years courtesy of Zoom, the trio finally met in Iceland in April to record the 11-track album at Leifshús Art Farm on a mountainside overlooking a fjord.

Ther talents are fused on the album, Unanswered, produced by Steve MacLachlan who also plays drums on the release. Aside from their exceptional voices, Ward plays sansula, Townes plays guitars and Knútur plays guitars, keys and synths. Completing the line-up are guests Sarah Matthews on violin and viola and Evan McCosham on bass.

The album’s title track was a last minute contender for the shortlist. Says Lucy: “It was written in the studio, a surprise extra - inspired by a tale told to Adyn and Svavar as they travelled across Iceland together. It’s the true story of an old telephone, clearly disconnected for many years, that still sometimes rings…though no-one ever dares to answer the ghostly caller. In our song, we have married English and Icelandic to tell the tale. The Icelandic choruses tell three separate stories of who could be calling, while the English verses tell the tale of plucking up the courage to finally answer the phone.”

Unanswered is released on Betty Beetroot Records on October 6 and Ward Knútur Townes will showcase it on a UK tour starting in Lucy’s home town of Derby on October 13 – a hybrid gig that is also being screened by Live To Your Living Room. The 18-date tour visits The Greystones in Sheffield on October 19.

For Lucy , now a mum of three young boys and with four successful solo studio albums behind her – the new album reaffirms her place as one of UK’s folk’s most powerful and captivating artists. Her songwriting has been described as ‘passion, protest and tradition rolled into one’.

Dubbed ‘Brit-Folk’s most vibrant and forthright young talent’ by MOJO, ‘impressive and original’ by The Guardian and ‘inspiring’ by Billy Bragg, Lucy

won the Best Newcomer gong at the 2012 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards and was one of the youngest ever nominees for Folk Singer of the Year at the 2014

Awards while her Single Flame album became one of MOJO’s top albums of 2013.

Across the Atlantic alt-indie artist Adyn (Andrew M.L. Brown in the writing credits) is a five time International Songwriting Competition finalist and

winner of the 2020 Music New Brunswick SOCAN Song of the Year Award for House on the Ocean.

Completing the trio Svavar is a singular songwriter from the north of Iceland with a sublime voice and sharp observation. He was the first recipient of the Anna Palina Arnadottir Memorial Award for folk music excellence in Iceland. In 2007, with his band Hraun, he reached the final five in the BBC World Service’s ‘Next Big Thing’ contest, which which had the tall order of finding the best group or artist on the planet!