LOATHLY
LADY

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Loathly Lady is a feminist cataloguing project founded by London-based performer and researcher Amy Hollinrake. 

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It is an online resource for researches and performers to encounter traditional music and engage with it in new ways. Loathly Lady follows a unique classification system which takes issues of concern to women as its central organising principle. Identifying narrative motifs in folk songs and ballads, and creating archetypes through a feminist lens to redefine the way we think about folk songs, how we perform them, and how we describe them.

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This as an ever-evolving project that performers can respond to, use creatively, for research, and be a point of forwarding critical discussion around gender and identity in the traditional music scene. Moving away from the canon of male folk collectors to critically engage, and create space, for women both historically and presently. 

 

This project aims to create new work, transform the old and archive the feminist.