Friday, 2nd August, 1939
‘PHILOMENA’ BRINGS A DARKER VOICE TO NEW ACCRINGTON MUSICAL
A formidable new character steps from the shadows as Mind The Trams moves towards the stage
Until now, much of the music emerging from Mind The Trams has belonged to bakery counters, ballroom floors, friendships, courtship and the everyday humour of Lancashire life.
Philomena changes the atmosphere.
The striking new song from Accrington author and songwriter Gabriel Undici introduces Sister Mary Philomena, one of the most formidable characters in the world of Mind The Trams and a woman whose certainty leaves little room for compromise.
As the twenty-song collection increasingly takes shape as a developing Accrington Musical, Philomena offers listeners their first glimpse of the darker road waiting beyond the warmth of Oswaldtwistle.
The laughter hasn’t disappeared.
But somewhere, a door has closed.
A WOMAN OF ABSOLUTE CERTAINTY
Sister Mary Philomena does not consider herself cruel.
That may be what makes her so unsettling.
She believes in order.
Duty.
Obedience.
And consequences.
Within her world there are rules governing how a person should live, how a young woman should behave and what must follow when those rules are broken.
Philomena gives that certainty a voice.
There is no shouting.
There doesn’t need to be.
WHEN FAITH BECOMES JUDGEMENT
The song draws upon the religious and social attitudes surrounding unmarried women in the late 1930s, when respectability could carry enormous weight and judgement could arrive long before compassion.
Yet Philomena is not simply presented as a villain’s song.
The more uncomfortable question is whether Sister Mary Philomena genuinely believes that everything she does is right.
That distinction gives the character her power.
She does not wake each morning intending to cause suffering.
She wakes believing she knows what is best.
A DIFFERENT SIDE OF MIND THE TRAMS
For audiences discovering the project through its music, Philomena reveals the breadth of the developing Accrington Musical.
There is room in Mind The Trams for Jerry and his cheese pies.
For Ada and Mo across the garden fence.
For Nellie’s lipstick and Saturday-night dreams.
But there must also be room for the people and institutions capable of changing another person’s life forever.
The lighthearted songs allow us to know the community.
Songs such as Philomena remind us what that community may eventually have to face.
FROM LANCASHIRE NOVEL TO ACCRINGTON MUSICAL
Written by local Accrington author and songwriter Gabriel Undici, Philomena forms part of the twenty original songs inspired by the novel Mind The Trams, set principally around Oswaldtwistle and Accrington in 1939.
The complete Mind The Trams Songbook is now providing the musical foundations for a potential original Accrington Musical — a production rooted in Lancashire characters, local history, humour, friendship, love and the lives of ordinary people approaching an extraordinary period of history.
From Lockwood’s Bakery to St George’s Ballroom and eventually beyond the familiar streets of home, each song adds another voice to the story.
Philomena’s is one audiences may find difficult to forget.
DISCOVER THE SONGBOOK
Philomena is available now as part of the twenty-song Mind The Trams Songbook, streaming on Spotify and major music platforms.
Discover the novel, Songbook, artwork and growing Accrington Herald collection at:
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