Chris Murphy and Seth Lakeman Find New Life in Tradition With Songs From The Trees Album

Los Angeles-based multi-instrumentalist Chris Murphy gives Songs From The Trees the character of a musical encounter between memory and discovery. This seven-song album, created with British folk musician Seth Lakeman, brings Americana, progressive folk, and world music together in a setting where old sounds carry contemporary emotional weight. Murphy’s songwriting remains the centre of the project, but Lakeman’s instrumental imagination gives these compositions new movement, allowing the music to feel both rooted and unexpectedly open.

The collaboration grew from Murphy’s admiration for Lakeman’s ability to approach traditional music with reverence while keeping it alive. That distinction matters throughout Songs From The Trees. The album does not treat folk heritage as a museum piece. Its maritime references, Appalachian atmosphere, and contemporary rhythmic influences become part of a broader conversation about how people carry history, love, loss, and hope into the present.

Recorded in a sixteenth-century monastery in Plymouth, the project also carries a strong sense of place. Murphy describes the surrounding Dartmoor landscape as an important influence, and the album’s musical world seems to reflect that environment: expansive in feeling, yet intimate in its attention to detail. The recording process itself was unusually direct, with Murphy, Lakeman, and engineer Josiah J. Manning working as a compact trio over five days, developing and mixing one song at a time with minimal second thoughts.

That immediacy is central to the album’s appeal. Lakeman’s contributions on banjo, guitar, fiddle, and mandolin complement Murphy’s vocals and multi-instrumental approach, while Manning’s guitar work and engineering help preserve the emotional character of the performances. The resulting sound moves between folk, rock, classical, ambient, and world music without losing its sense of purpose.

Murphy’s description of his music as a “live film score” is especially fitting here. Songs From The Trees feels cinematic because it creates atmosphere without overwhelming the songs themselves. Its emotional world is built from suggestion, texture, and the spaces between sounds.

Songs From The Trees succeeds as a thoughtful collaboration between two musicians who understand that tradition becomes most meaningful when it keeps evolving. Chris Murphy and Seth Lakeman have created an album that honours the past while remaining curious about what music can still become.

Get In Touch With Chris Murphy:

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chrismurphymusic1/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/chrismurphyviolin/?hl=en

Bandcamp: https://chrismurphyviolin.bandcamp.com/album/songs-from-the-trees

Website: https://chrismurphymusic.com/