Songs of the Land - A Collective Storytelling Project

Songs of the Land is a travelling book, collecting storis about the historic landscapes that make you feel something. That could be a connection to a place or time, it could be love, it could be a strong happy memory, it could be fear, it could be joy, it could be childhood exploration or family trips, it could be a spot that reminds you of a favourite book or television programme. 

The landscape holds on to memory, and those memories are the beginnings of stories. We want to collect these stories together to form a collective, collaborative story book all about people's experiences of the historic landscape. Historic landscapes can be anywhere - not just a castle or a prehistoric stone circle, but a town square, an isolated hilltop, a coastal walk, a ruined factory, a crumbling series of dry stone walls, a favourite pub, an old school building. We want stories of all these kinds of landscapes, and more.

The physical book of Songs of the Land will travel around the UK for the period of the festival, collecting stories. Separate pages can also be sent in to use to be added, or if you live further afield or prefer digital means of expressing yourself, we'll be hosting an Instagram page. 

You can tell your story in any way - poetry, written accounts, paintings, drawings, collage, mixed media artworks, video, audio - you have freedom to tell your story your way. 

Throughout the festival we will be holding interactive creative sessions via Zoom - on poetry, on creative writing, on different art forms - to help inspire you to tell your story. Run by creatives and artists working in heritage and archaeology, they weave together archaeology and art. Look out for more "songs of the land" events coming up on the Festival of Archaeology site soon and book your space!

There are three ways you can get involved:

• Put your name down to be added to the list to recieve the book. Please note spaces will be limited, and drawn at random. Please email penelope.foreman@cpat.org.uk to be added to the list
• Send you pages to the project organiser, Penelope Foreman, at CPAT, The Office, Coed y Dinas, Welshpool, Powys, SY16 2QR. Pages should be A4 in size to fit into the book. 
• Submit digital content to go on our Instagram page - @songoftheland -  by email to penelope.foreman@cpat.org.uk