The Wassail Celebration during the Rivers300 year
25th January 2025
A Wassail festival in January was introduced early during the period of restoration in the 1990s of the discovered collection of untended fruit trees (see the Rivers300 articles by Diana Richards, Hazel Mead and Susan Clark for more details). Wassail offered the local community a way to take possession of what has become Rivers Heritage Orchard, based on a small site that had once belonged to a great horticultural business. Wassail serves to announce that the Sawbridgeworth area had always, prior to WWII, made its living as a rural economy. Wassail and wassail traditions also make Rivers Orchard part of a network of community orchards and mark the beginning of the fruit growing year.
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| Medieval wassail garb…… |
Over these years Wassail has grown and changed but the cold, the darkness, the sparkling fire, the gathering of families to sing the traditional songs have never lost their magic. Different groups have contributed - visiting mummers, various bands of musicians, especially a local ukulele group, and others. However, a steadfast presence has been the flute player Zoe Dedman, who started joining in the music making while still studying and now leads the Wassail singing.
The Rivers300 year called for a new song. So Zoe and Elizabeth Waugh, Rivers archivist, decided to meet in the summer beforehand to write one. The words (see below) are based on Rivers history suggested by Elizabeth and set to music by Zoe. We hummed and strummed and made a video recording. We resolved to use Zoe’s current position as a physics teacher at Herts and Essex School to summon the usually indifferent high school students to our festival as wassail choir. Zoe’s were happy to come. Then, surprisingly when Zoe showed this brief video to a Leventhorpe school choir group, they immediately started humming, swaying, singing and playing keyboards along with the old tunes. Their teachers encouraged the project. Then on the day, 25 January 2025, after much signing of forms, along the young musicians came to the Orchard.
at Herts and Essex School to summon the usually indifferent high school students to our festival as a wassail choir. Zoe’s were happy to come. Then, surprisinglyNever has there been a more packed and enthusiastic crowd as the students with their families joined the bright blustery scene. Never has the singing been louder. Never has Zoe conducted a more tuneful group. It was a joyful experience. The harvest in September that followed the kickoff at Wassail in January was exceptionally prolific despite the dry summer. It was the singing that set the trees going, wasn’t it?
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| A great crowd gathered to chant the new Rivers300 Wassail song with Zoe and the school singers against the illuminated backdrop of the Orchard. | Steve and Lanier around the Wassail fire. |
Elizabeth Waugh - 2025.
Wassail Song for Rivers 300th year
A gardener came to Sawbridgeworth in 1725.
John Rivers sold his plants here, here by the main roadside.
Experiments took place as well as different crops were tried.
Business took root and through the years it thrived, it thrived.
Pour on the cider, bang the drum - say grow say grow
Come see the Orchard, sing to trees Wassail Wassail
Fruit became the greatest crop, bare-rooted healthy trees.
Glasshouses warmed and sheltered plants from wilting by cold breeze.
Darwin asked the famous Tom the secrets of the breeds.
Early plum and Conference pear have pleased, have pleased.
Pour on the cider, bang the drum - say grow say grow
Come see the Orchard, sing to trees Wassail Wassail
But after wars, the soldier farmers would not hear the bell -
Soldier lads and army girls had skills they’d learned as well.
Motor cars would transport them to lead a better life they tell.
No staff, no profit, the nursery declined - sell, it must sell!
Pour on the cider, bang the drum - say grow say grow
Come see the Orchard, sing to trees Wassail Wassail
Houses and a hospital were built on Rivers land,
And yet the sense of loss remained, continuing demand
To save our rural heritage, preserve our glory the command.
Twenty years of bricks had covered all the land, no land.
Pour on the cider, bang the drum - say grow say grow
Come see the Orchard, sing to trees Wassail Wassail
Then two rangers went along old country lanes and found
Neglected Rivers fruit trees - people cleared the ground.
Now thriving apple trees give Sawbridgeworth their juice to down.
Wassail is heard again as voices rise in sound, in sound
Pour on the cider, bang the drum - say grow say grow
Come see the Orchard, sing to trees Wassail Wassail
Pour on the cider, bang the drum - say grow say grow
Come see the Orchard, sing to trees Wassail Wassail