Deck the halls with melancholy
Wishing you a wistful, Franco-Russian, romantic, sentimental, 1930s Christmas
Dear one and all,
Here is a brand new video for a song we released earlier this year, called ‘I wanted you to know’. The video adopts our usual technique of repurposing public domain footage, in this case from Romance Sentimentale, directed by Sergei Eisenstein and Grigori Aleksandrov, starring mysterious Latvian singer Mara Griy, and released in September 1930. Thematically, it’s a pretty uncanny fit.
The song came from a piano piece by Jake Sanders, augmented with lyrics by Nick and alchemised with vocals by Kate. The three of us talked about it in a wide-ranging conversation here. The whole thing was an exercise in serendipity that makes this project so worthwhile, along with the fact that people like you are listening and reading. Thank you!
Other releases this year include Been Dreaming About You Lately:
and I Delight in You:
All three have been punctuated by conversations on regrets and inner monologues, hynagogic states and ghosts and personal boundaries and human purpose.
Next year, Nick has a book about purpose, called The Road to Hell, coming out in the spring. And Kate’s debut novel And He Shall Appear shall appear with Fourth Estate in the autumn.
We’ll hopefully make time for more songs and writings in between.
Wishing you lyrical love and musical merriment
Kate & Nick
Songwritings is a conversation between Kate van der Borgh (copywriter, novelist, D&AD Masterclass trainer, singer, musician) and Nick Asbury (copywriter, poet, Perpetual Disappointments Diarist, with a side interest in Tin-Pan-Alley-tinged songwriting). The conversation features original songs, usually written by Nick, then reinterpreted and brought to life with Kate on all instruments and vocals.