The Ballad of Elias Hall

The year is seventeen hundred and one Elias Hall walked through Oldham's church doors The women they were working, polishing bright brass Quietly humming the Psalms as they knelt down and scrubbed clean the floors He needed more singers to fulfil his oath To have a really good choir to lead the Easter praise But women were forbidden, to sing with men in church The elders wouldn't let them, their innocent voices to raise Three women they sang, surrounded by men In their own parish church for the very first time Accused of witchcraft, casting demonic spells They placed their necks and their lives, on the line Auditions they were held, but nobody saw The faces of these women, just their voices were heard Though the sound it was angelic, when all was revealed John Taylor cried out 'Blasphemy, it's heresy, women singing is absurd Three women they sang, surrounded by men In their own parish church for the very first time Accused of witchcraft, casting demonic spells They placed their necks and their lives, on the line The wives of the town, wouldn't let their men sing The church doors were bolted, they couldn't get in Though he thought all was lost, his hopes ne'er to be found Elias Hall he faced them and fearing for his life he stood his ground The vicar he relented, saw the error of his ways He let the women sing behind a screen by the west door And so, for the first time, in seventeen hundred years Women sang aloud in church, in a choir where they'd never sung before This wasn't done in London, Paris or in Rome But in Oldham, at St. Mary's, by a man who stood his ground Elias Hall Three women they sang, surrounded by men In their own parish church for the very first time Accused of witchcraft, casting demonic spells They placed their necks and their lives, on the line