The last song on the album also happens to be the last one we wrote, and is unique in that it came to me already half-formed.

It started life as a piece originally composed by Annie for a Chorlton Players’ stage production of ‘Live Like Pigs’ by John Arden in 2008. The play centres around the feelings of travelling folk in the 20th century, and Annie had written a couple of verses to set the scene for the play.

My challenge, therefore, unlike the way we usually work, was to pick up the threads of the story Annie had started and find a way to complete it. I let the ideas stew for half a year before I was nudged into completing the song in July 2009.

Incidentally, ‘Slobuzenja’ is a Romany word that means ‘freedom’ but which has also come to refer to the diaspora of the Roma into western Europe and the USA following the abolition of slavery in Romania.

 

 

 

You come and go
Like a fox with eyes so bright, your oats to sow
It’s not the same
If they find us a home
What price are they asking?

We never asked to leave
And our voices were not heard
No sound at all
So here we stay
Could we learn to live inside this ordinary cage?

The weeks roll by
There’s a hope within us all that things have changed
The day to day
Is a life that’s unaware
No goods for the taking

But I’m not about to leave
And my heart still on the road
My head held high
I’ll stay another day
And by morning I’ll be on my way

Slobuzenja, is a song that never ends
It’s the voices of our friends
It’s a life we recommend
Come along and go with the flow
Learn as much as one man can know
Looking for what you need, you’ll find
Nothing is guaranteed

You come and go
Like a fox with eyes so bright, your oats to sow
It’s not the same
If they find us a home
What price are they asking?

We’re gonna have to leave
Trust our fortunes to the road
A chance to take
We cannot stay
So by morning we’ll be on our way

 

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