Album: Lesley Garret, A North Country Lass (Music Infinity)

We're more used to hearing folk ballads sung with a finger in the ear these days, but there's a possibility that their origins were more akin to the demure, precisely enunciated delivery adopted by Lesley Garrett on this collection.

After all, "Pastime with Good Company" was written by Henry VIII, rather than a horny-handed son of toil. Yet, although she negotiates some of these most poignant of melodies with great care, at times her classical training serves as a straitjacket. Most alarmingly, the upright manner of "The Raggle Taggle Gypsies" and "Blow the Wind Southerly" revives unwelcome memories of The White Heather Club.

DOWNLOAD THIS The Bold Grenadier; He Moved Through the Fair; Pastime with Good Company