The Miners' Hymns

Film by Bill Morrison
Music by Jóhann Jóhannsson
with American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME)
Produced by Forma

"A lost industrial past stirs in an unforgettable live concert performance of Jóhann Jóhannsson's score with Bill Morrison's film. 5 out of 5 stars."
— The Observer (London)

"Elegant, elegiac... enthralling."
— The New York Times

"Voiceless, almost textless... A beautiful and devastating work, having the weight of tragedy."
— Alex Ross, music critic for The New Yorker

"The Miners’ Hymns is a haunting and powerful portrait of the consequences of actions. Now, more than ever, we need works of art like this"
— Drowned in Sound

"A meticulousness and sense of interlinked completeness surrounds the piece, evident in the detailed early research from all involved in the project to the composition of the score, collation of archive footage and tonight’s live performance [at the Barbican]"
— Music OMH

"The beauty of the images – sea coalers gleaning on the beach, mucky kiddies sliding joyfully down a hill of coal in a game of cowboys and indians – and the slowly building majesty of the music merged together towards a mighty climax... A splendid coup de film."
— The Guardian

"You will not see a more beautiful, moving and truthful memorial to the industrial working class"
— Morning Star (London)

The former coal mining communities in North East England are the subject of this inspired documentary project by American multi-media artist Bill Morrison and Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson. The story is told entirely without words, with a remarkable original score featuring string quartet and 18-piece brass section. Using rarely-seen footage from the British Film Institute, the BBC, and other archives, The Miners' Hymns celebrates social, cultural, and political aspects of an extinct industry. Focusing on the Durham coalfield, it touches on universally relevant themes while depicting the hardship of pit work, increasing mechanisation, the role of trade unions in organising and fighting for workers' rights, and their annual Miners' Gala in Durham.

Jóhann Jóhannsson’s exquisite composition draws upon the brass music tradition that was so intertwined with the mining communities. Each colliery had its own brass band, comprised of miners, which played at social and union events, such as the Miners’ Gala, in its heyday the largest trades union event in Europe, attended by over 250,000 people.

The film cuts between footage from different eras spanning 100 years – from grainy footage of primitive conditions from early last century, through processes of increased mechanisation, and up to the still highly emotive year-long miners’ strike of 1984-5. While almost entirely composed of black and white archival footage, the film also includes two contemporary sequences shot in color from a helicopter hovering over the sites of former collieries. No trace remains of the mines.

Writes The Washington Post: “With Jóhannsson’s gorgeous score providing mournful counterpoint to the visual world Morrison has both revived and created anew, The Miners’ Hymns leaves the audience with the ineffable sense of being between times, landscapes and emotions. True to the sacramental suggestion of the film’s title, the feeling is a lot like a prayer.”

Commissioned by BRASS: Durham International Festival 2010; Supported by Durham County Council, Arts Council England, British Film Institute, One North East, Northern Film + Media and the UK Film Council's Digital Film Archive Fund supported by the National Lottery

Video

Audio

Press Reviews

Past Performances & Selected Press Quotes New York Times: The Miners' Hymns Review Washington Post: The Miners' Hymns Review New York Times: The Miners' Hymns Review The Rest Is Noise: The Miners' Hymns Review

Photos