Ballad Lines review – heartbreaking, full-throated folk music for the ages

2026-01-30 - 12:35

Southwark Playhouse Borough, London Composer Finn Anderson and director Tania Azevedo have created a powerful generational journey through the history of Appalachian song Much of the music of central Appalachia – the mountainous region linking Virginia, Kentucky, Tennessee and the Carolinas – derives from the Scots-Irish people who settled there. It was the Ulster immigrants, passing down their boisterous tunes and melancholy ballads, who gifted the US some of its first iterations of country music. Composer Finn Anderson and director Tania Azevedo have used that journey to tell a musical story across generations. Our starting point is New York couple Sarah and Alix, moving into their new home and Marie Kondo-ing a mystery box sent to Sarah by a dying aunt. It turns out to contain audio tapes tracing song origins back up the family line, a reconnection to Sarah’s West Virginia roots that is first unwelcome and then increasingly transformative. Continue reading...