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February 10th |
Brenda Wootton (Birth) | |||||||||
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Born in London, but brought up in Newlyn, Brenda Wootton (née Ellery) (1928 – 1994) was a Cornish poet and folk singer. Equally at home writing and singing in English, Cornish and in Breton, Wootton became seen as an ambassador for Cornish tradition and culture both in Britain as well as in Australia and Canada and, of course, Brittany where she was the star of the very first ‘Festival Interceltique de Lorient’ in August 1970 which occurs every year to this day. Wootton came to attention through her participation in amateur concerts in Cornish village halls and became active in folk music in the early 1960s to the extent that Breton folk singers came to regard her as of their own. Although she became world famous, Brenda Wootton never abandoned her Cornish childhood roots. She opened her own folk music club, the ‘Pipers Folks Club’, in St. Buryan well after she became famous and she became much loved for her request show, ‘Sunday Best’ on BBC Radio Cornwall, so popular that a commemorative blue plaque is now on the wall of the radio studio building in Truro. Many of her songs, composed with Richard Gendall, have become Celtic standards, notably Lamorna, The White Rose, Camborne Hill and The Stratton Carol as well as ballads such as Mordonnow, Tamar and Lyonesse.
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