Good evening Ghouls and Goblins and welcome again to The Folk Horror Podcast Spotlight. Put the fire on, get a glass of hot whiskey, light a candle and switch off the lights because this week we have a spooky storytelling from The Widdershins. 

 Widdershins is composed of narrator Ashley Nunez and musician Joe Saburin. Ashley is the owner of Old Growth Alchemy and describes herself as ‘purveyor of botanical libations and sensual ephemera.’ Her shop sells all kinds of potions and concoctions for your local occultists, witches and anyone interested in the old ways. Joe teaches music and musician in his own right with an album called Dead Leaves. He can also be heard on lots of different musical projects. 

Each episode they pick a tale of folklore, legends, fairies, monsters and ghosts and compose their own telling of the stories. With a wonderful added touch Joe composes a soundtrack with his guitar for each episode. At the end of the episode they get together to discuss the story and the development of the presentation. I am always interested to hear hot takes on what the meaning of a story could be (blame Blindboy!) and it is also cool to hear Joe talking about the composition he performed. If you want to hear a great example of this then tune into the Goblin Market by Christina Rosetti. As a narrative poem you get to hear Ashley performing quite an animated retelling as she keeps up with the prose while Joe creates a song to keep up. The discussion afterwards is another episode in itself! 

 Looking through the episode list they have so far chosen tales from the likes of Edgar Allen Poe, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, M.R. James, The Brothers Grimm, Amelia Edwards, Robert Louis Stevenson and Mary Shelley. With only twenty one episodes so far there is lots more to come too.

https://www.oldgrowthalchemy.com

https://www.joesabourin.com/

 Until next time…