Peggy Seeger
Everything Changes
Signet Music

www.peggyseeger.com
 

Everything Changes is not at all a Peggy Seeger recording I would have anticipated. It is far more a chanteuse album than an album of folk songs. Peggy notes this is the first she has done entirely of contemporary songs most of which she wrote solo or in collaboration – and she notes collaborative writing is something new and exhilarating for her. It is something of a family affair, as her son Calum MacColl both produced and helped arrange the record, as well as playing guitar and ukulele. The rest of the house band here is Martyn Blake on drums, James Hallawell on keys and bassist Simon Edwards, and they are versatile and supple as they help make this a decidedly modern album.

Eight of the eleven songs are Peggy’s. “Swim To The Star” written with Calum MacColl was commissioned by the BBC for a show marking the centenary of the Titanic’s sinking. “We Watch You Slip Away” was written with Kate St. John (formerly of The Dream Academy) about the slow passing of Kate’s mother. Peggy’s mother Ruth who died from cancer in 1953 and her childhood are evoked in “Everything Changes.”

This new notion of writing songs collaboratively seems to have opened Peggy to new ways of recording as well. Calum’s production technique here is a new process for Peggy as she only plays instruments on two selections, thus freeing her to concentrate on her singing which is both sweeter and darker than usual. And most compelling.

Yes, Everything Changes is different from anything Peggy Seeger has ever done before, definitely a “Songs of Experience” kind of thing she could never have done as a young woman. A lifetime has gone into reaching the place she sings from here. The result is a quietly compelling album of songs that took a lifetime to be able to write and sing. A most eloquent and rich album.

— Michael Tearson