Some time ago I wrote a piece concerning West Gallery singing and music. Much of the interest shown in reviving this form of church music was coming from the ‘folk’ movement. Dave Townsend, the guru of such matters, lives in Oxfordshire and the new West Gallery groups which first sprang up all seemed to be based in the southern part of the country. With time the movement has spread further afield, as these things do. Now it is possible to tell you of one such group here in Lancashire, and whose roots go deep into the past. Not only that: you could quite easily go and listen to them, should you so wish, and there may even be some people reading this who would fancy having a go at singing or playing this kind of music.

As for putting together this article I should like to place on record my sincere thanks for all the help and information provided by Jean Seymour of Bury; to her I’m greatly indebted. Jean is both secretary and conductor of the group, and for anyone looking to join the Quire or to make a booking the ‘phone number is 0161 761 1544, or e-mail ajseymour@onetel.net

In this current year, when Charles Wesley’s tercentenary is being celebrated, it’s worth considering what became of his remarkable output of close on nine thousand hymns. No one book could contain them all! In fact, many of them remain in obscurity. Remember, too, that many have written hymns and anthems; some of these people became widely known while others were never heard of outside their own locality – and neither were their works. Nevertheless, local choirs kept some of these works alive, and this is the story of one such group of people.

"Up in the Forest of Rossendale, between Deerplay Moor and the wild hill called Swinshaw, there is a little, lone valley, a green cup in the mountains, called Dean. The inhabitants of this valley are so notable for their love of music that they are known all through the vales of Rossendale as Th’Deign Layrocks, or The Larks of Dean."

These are the words of Lancashire author Edwin Waugh, on the subject of the composers, singers and instrumentalists whose activities in the Rossendale valley spanned the period between the 1740s and the 1860s.. By Waugh’s time, Rossendale was no longer the royal hunting ground that ‘forest’ suggests. It was (and still is) made up of a large number of small communities strung along the bottoms of the valleys. Cotton and shoe-making became its main industries in Victorian times, but in the mid-eighteenth century most people were handloom weavers – including the group who became known as The Larks of Dean.

Much came from the pens of the aforementioned Edwin Waugh, and Lancashire historians Rev.J.Marshall Mather and Thomas Newbigging, writing in the second half of the nineteenth century. All three claimed acquaintance with actual members of the group, and certainly Newbigging knew the music. He claimed to have a manuscript book of fifty tunes, which he believed to be only a fraction of what existed. How right he was!

Later came a series of articles by Samuel Compston of Crawshawbooth, published in the Rossendale Free Press between September 1904 and January 1905. The inspiration for this was the presentation of a manuscript book of 255 tunes to Rawtenstall library by Moses Heap, ‘the last of the Layrocks’.

There are now fifty books preserved, many in manuscript form. Most are now housed in the County Record Office in Preston, with some still in private hands and half a dozen volumes – including a transcript of Moses Heap’s diary - in Rawtenstall museum, together with a cello, a fiddle, a clarinet and a serpent which once belonged to the players.

It all began with a sober young man, John Nuttall of Bacup, who, with another of like mind, Richard Hudson of Loveclough, followed the example of John Wesley and other itinerant preachers by going about on horseback preaching, teaching and singing the new religious music that was gaining favour. (Nuttall was mainly responsible for the religion and Hudson for the music.)They happened to be Baptists, and it was in the Baptist Chapels of Rossendale that most of the music of The Larks of Dean was kept alive – and where some can still be heard, upon occasion, even today.

Nuttall and Hudson both regarded music as playing an important part in religion and they gathered about them players and singers to help focus the religious fervour. They married two sisters, both reputed to have been excellent singers. Nuttall settled in the Lumb area; he held religious meetings in houses and farms around Dean, and he began to teach music. This led to the formation of a musical club in 1742 – generally regarded as the beginning of The Larks of Dean, with John Nuttall as the founding father, although this possibly underestimates the part played by Richard Hudson.

The names of various composers from the Nuttall and Hudson families constantly crop up, as do those of Ashworth and Hargreaves. There’s a large number of manuscripts from the Greenwood family too, although they don’t seem to have actually done any composing.

As a result of these activities a small Baptist chapel was built around 1750, next to Lumb parish church, and John Nuttall became its first Minister. The local worshippers soon outgrew these premises and in 1860 a new chapel was built on top of the moors at Goodshaw, which was deemed to be a more central location, and The Larks transported their instruments over the rough moorland terrain every Sunday to perform in the singing pew there. (It’s perhaps worth pointing out that here, as in many other Baptist chapels, the musicians’ pew was not in a west gallery but at floor level, directly in front of the central pulpit and under the eye of the preacher. None of your Under the Greenwood Tree goings-on in Rossendale!)

Many tales are told of the splendid music that used to be a feature of the services at Goodshaw. It was even said that it could be heard on top of Cribden, a hill-top two miles away!

Coincidentally, Goodshaw Chapel lasted as long as The Larks of Dean: when it closed in 1860 in favour of the present chapel on the main Bunley road, the heyday of The Larks was also passing. Today the Goodshaw Old Chapel with its box pews, high central pulpit and, of course, the singing pew, belongs to English Heritage and can be visited by arrangement.

When not performing their own music, The Larks of Dean were very partial to that of Handel. However, robust singing in the local accent caused one conductor to declare that if the choir didn’t stop singing, "He thrusted in God," in the ‘Messiah’ chorus, they would be thrust outside! Similarly, who but a local – with his droll sense of humour - would have entitled a composition ‘The Gas Homiter March’?! (Probably written to mark the construction of the gasholders, or gasometers, at Cloughfold.)

The new chapel still celebrates the anniversary of the old one – currently on the first Sunday in July – with an afternoon service in the graveyard of the old chapel. In the evening, again in the old chapel, an all-comers’ choir joins in a set service which includes two choruses from Handel’s ‘Messiah’; a tune called ‘Nearer Home’ by J.B.Woodbury; Moses Heap’s ‘Ramah’, and three tunes from The Larks of Dean collection: ‘Courage’ (Joseph Nicholds), ‘Spanking Rodger’ (James Nuttall) and ‘Farewell’ (Rev.Joseph Harbottle).

to be continued in the next issue