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Song of Aud the Deep​-​Minded

from Lasses Trust In Providence by Claire White with Robbie Leask

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  • Compact Disc (CD) + Digital Album

    Compact Disc in a plastic-free cardboard case with an accompanying 20-page booklet. Stunning Shetland landscape photography forms the backdrop to written stories behind all thirteen tracks, and a glossary of over 300 Shetland words helps with lyric translation.

    Includes unlimited streaming of Lasses Trust In Providence via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
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about

I grew up in Lerwick where the annual Up-Helly-Aa Viking festival is celebrated with a male-only guizing tradition. I’d long been curious about the role of women in Viking society and was intrigued to learn from a friend in 2015 of female Iceland settler, Aud the Deep-Minded. My research into Aud’s life took me to Norway, Estonia and Iceland where I learned that this Norwegian noblewoman was born in a crusading age with aspirations to secure her family’s future by cunning and conquest. Aud was made an orphan, widow and grieving mother in her dramatic lifetime, but she overcame vulnerability using courage and strong leadership skills, securing her place in history as an independent and influential land-claimant. Here is Aud’s story in song, with grateful thanks to Hannah Mary Goodlad for first mentioning her name and to Vilborg Davíðsdóttir for sharing her extensive knowledge of Aud.

lyrics

My father Ketil Flatnose
From Raumsdal he fled
Escaping Harald Finehair
A king we’d come to dread
The Hebrides called hersirs
To Scotland’s kinder land
From these isles we sailed forth
A-Viking to expand

Hold, hold

Steadfast, resolute

Hold, hold

Destiny refute

The quest to conquer Ireland
Was fought by love and raid
Olaf the White I married
A Dublin Queen was made
A son, Thorstein, we nurtured
Before my man was slayed
For Irish king tomb raiding
With Olaf’s life we paid

The Hebrides our refuge
Thorstein the Red and me
Grandson he met grandfather
Learned campaigns at his knee
North Scotland Thorstein conquered
He wed and brought forth young
Scots treachery then claimed him
And Ketil too was gone

This left me now defenceless
With rancour all around
Lost mother, orphan, widow
A daring plan I found
A ship was built in Caithness
Concealed by forest shade
The knarr was bound for Iceland
Strategic stops we made

With kin and slaves and free men
An Orkney trip I led
The first of my granddaughters
A Scottish chief she wed
Then on we sailed to Faroe
And married one more girl
Before wild Iceland beckoned
My fate at last to thirl

My crew of twenty members
Gained liberty and land
Dales then I claimed for me
As home, my final hand
With youngest grandchild married
My life’s work it was done
The wedding feast, my funeral
In death and life I’d won

credits

from Lasses Trust In Providence, track released December 10, 2018
Composition, vocals, fiddle: Claire White
Guitar: Robbie Leask

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about

Claire White Scotland, UK

Claire White is an award-winning Shetland singer-songwriter and fiddler. She learned music from Dr Tom Anderson and has been performing and teaching internationally for twenty-five years. She has previously played in Australia, New Zealand, the United Arab Emirates, the USA, Canada, Iceland, Norway, Sardinia, Turkey, Italy, Germany, Slovenia, Estonia, Poland, Ireland and the UK. ... more

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