12:39, 7 JAN 2021
Inside the burnt out John Tams factory in Longton. (Image: Pete Stonier/StokeonTrentLive)
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Police officers have launched an investigation following a fire at the former John Tams factory in Stoke-on-Trent.
I wonder if the songs we know and love to sing together were ever more needed than they are now. I mean especially those songs that bind us together at this time of year, Christmas carols.
Carols and songs, like people, cross oceans and continents and borders and language barriers. They find new life and new meaning, new power and relevance, when we adopt and adapt them, take them to our hearts, and sing them out together, all of us loving the tune, and meaning every word.
Two carols come to mind, both about our longing for one another, for home, for peace and goodwill. Both are connected to my story War Horse and the First World War.