Meles Lutra sail from Zennor to the Seven Stones on new album

Somewhere in the grey water between Cornwall and the Isles of Scilly sits a reef that has wrecked ships for centuries. It now lends its name to a record. Meles Lutra, the Cornwall duo of Chris and Annabelle South, return on Friday 25 September with their third album, Seven Stones, a collection drawn from the coastline, wildlife and folklore of the far South West.

A voyage from Zennor to Scilly

The album plays as a journey through the pair’s favourite places. It moves from the wild coast at Zennor to the seabird colonies of Scilly, and from the shelter of Falmouth Bay out to the Seven Stones reef itself. Their music blends folk, jazz and classical elements around woodwind and voice, and it keeps circling back to the natural world. Chris and Annabelle South write to celebrate that world and to raise awareness of the pressures on it.

In Like a Lion, and the turning of spring

The record opens instrumentally. In Like a Lion traces the arrival of spring in Cornwall, the season coming in with a roar before it settles. It sets the tone for what follows, a set of pieces that treat local places and old stories as worth the attention.

Saints, mermaids and the Bell and the Stag

Cornish legend runs through the middle of the album. The Bell and the Stag tells the story of Saint Kea, a fifth century figure the duo cast as an early hunt saboteur, remembered for stepping between a stag and the hounds chasing it. The Mermaid of Zennor retells one of Cornwall’s most enduring legends, the pull of the sea given a face and a voice.

The Seven Stones, a reef and a lightship

At the centre sits the title track. The Seven Stones reef lies between Cornwall and Scilly and has been blamed for hundreds of shipwrecks over the centuries. Written in 7/8 time, the piece carries the danger and the resilience of the place, along with the history of the Seven Stones lightship and the lives it has helped to save. Running from the Wolf keeps to the water, a tribute to the Scillonian III ferry and the rough Atlantic crossings between Penzance and the Isles of Scilly.

📷Credit: Paul Isaac

Songs for Cornwall’s wildlife

Wildlife is written into the record as much as landscape. Trelissick Dolphin Lullaby came out of a real dolphin rescue that Annabelle attended as a volunteer Marine Mammal Medic with British Divers Marine Life Rescue. Reun Loos ow Koska yn Kres, Cornish for Grey Seal Sleeping in Peace, holds the stillness of seals bottling in the water near Coverack and St Agnes.

📷Credit: Paul Isaac

A launch night for two Cornish causes

Seven Stones arrives on Bandcamp and other streaming platforms on Friday 25 September. The following evening, Saturday 26 September, Meles Lutra play a launch concert at St Kea Church, starting at 7.30pm, in aid of Truro Foodbank and British Divers Marine Life Rescue. Tickets for the evening of music and stories are on Eventbrite.

Hundreds of ships have come to grief on the Seven Stones over the centuries. This record carries the name back to shore.

📷Credit: Paul Isaac