Folk singer-songwriter Ellie Gowers brings tour for debut album Dwelling By The Weir to Groundlings Theatre in Portsmouth

But Ellie doesn’t just delve into the past on Dwelling By The Weir – there are songs which also address more modern concerns and their impact.

Like so many other, Ellie had the wind knocked from the sails of her nascent music career by the pandemic. At the start of lockdown Ellie returned home to Warwick from Bristol, where she had been since her university days.

With time on her hands, she says: ‘I spent a lot of time walking around my hometown and exploring it and rediscovering places that I'd forgotten about.

‘The whole album was inspired by this one spot, just outside Warwick called The Saxon Mill, which was a beautiful mill on the River Avon – now a pub – and I spent a lot of time over lockdown walking the footpaths there, which are these ancient footpaths where once upon a time they would have led into the castle from places like Coventry. I spent a lot of time wandering these ancient paths and thinking about the people who had come before me, and who had made the county what it is today.’

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She began writing songs based on historic stories, but soon realised it didn’t feel complete.

‘When I started writing it,’ says Ellie, ‘I wanted the focus to be on Warwickshire folklore, and I was getting on with that idea, but I got to a point where I was reading books and writing songs on stories that had already been written and discovered. I kind of wanted to find "normal people" stories, they're the people who made the county what it is, and something like HS2 is a massive thing at the moment, changing the country and changing the landscape.

‘It felt really important to write about these people as opposed to folklore and things that may not have existed.’

One of the album’s stand-out tracks, Waking Up To Stone, was inspired by the controversial high speed rail route planned to link London and Manchester.

‘I really wanted to get a bit heavier and a bit angrier with that one, she explains, ‘but it was a lot of fun to make.’

To research the album, Ellie tells how she ‘ordered loads of books on Warwickshire stories and folklore, which was quite overwhelming because there's so much of it.’

From there she began chatting with historians, scoured The Herbert Art Gallery in Coventry and Warwick’s archives

‘What I found was only 0.2 per cent of all the stuff I could have written about,’ she laughs. ‘I encountered so much stuff I didn't know about, but felt like it was stuff I should've learned about. So that was interesting as well, to see the gaps in my education when it came to local folklore and stories.’

Another standout is A Letter to The Dead Husband of Mary Ball.

Ball poisoned her husband and as a result was hanged for her crime. She became the last person to be executed in public in Coventry, in 1849.

‘It's such a sad tale and I really wanted to capture her side of it and not just a man's side of that story. It was quite emotional to write, but fun to write and get into the characters.

‘She's not massively well-known, if you're a staunch Coventrian who's grown up there, you'd probably know who she is. but most people aren't aware of her.

‘I did a show in Bristol in May, and there was a chap there who used to date Mary Ball's great, great granddaughter, which I found absolutely bizarre. So her legacy lives on, and has family members who carry her with them.’

Renowned roots musician and producer Lukas Drinkwater has been part of Ellie’s live band and also produced her album.

He also got Ellie into open water swimming – which links back to the album’s origins and themes.

Going back to the Saxon Mill, there's a beautiful spot there to swim where you go under this place called Guy's Cliffe, and it's this old ruined house which is very spooky and looming. It's a very special place to swim.

‘I do try and get out if and where I can, depending on the weather. But the whole idea of nature has figured heavily on this album – particularly with songs like Waking Up To Stone and Dwelling By the Weir.’

Ellie is at The Groundlings Theatre, Portsea on November 26, doors 7.30pm. Support is from Million Pebble Beach, the piano-led project of Portsmouth-based singer-songwriter Clare Baker.

Tickets £12. Go to groundlings.co.uk.