The story of Cotswolds-based The Chine is very much the story of Penny Hinton. Having left school at 16, Hinton fell in with local musician Tam Fisher who rehearsed with his band in a stilted lodge in the woods outside Tetbury. Named after this woodland dwelling, Stilted Lodge consisted of Fisher (guitars and bazouki), Bren Bradley (harmonium) and the twin recorder attack of the Sherwood sisters, Bryony and Jeanine. It wasn’t long before Hinton was sitting in on rehearsals, improvising lyrics and singing along, though such was the delicacy of her ethereally whispered vocal, it took several weeks for the band to notice.

With Penny Hinton on board, the band marked their new incarnation by re-naming them-selves The Chine, Hinton having been invited to join on the proviso that she found a more audible way of singing. To this end, she developed an ear-splitting falsetto and her ability to swoop from ethereal whisper to piercing shriek (with virtually nothing in between) soon became her stock-in-trade. It quickly became clear that the band’s anxious apprehension (as they steeled themselves for Hinton’s unexpected and deafening interjections) gave the music an almost palpable tension that their contemporaries could only admire.

To write and record their first and only album the band moved into a rented farmhouse called ‘Otter’s Holt,’ where much of their best work was done. The resulting collection, ‘12 Madrigals for Simon’, was released in 1973. Lyrically Hinton’s pre-occupations came to the fore; Pagan mythology, English folklore and an obsessive and unrequited love for a local boy called Simon Hearn. Hearn, a slack-jawed, oafish, trainee estate-agent had somehow become the object of Hinton’s desires despite the pair never having spoken to each other.

Musically, the warm honeyed tones of Fisher’s guitar contrasted beautifully with the more thick-cut marmalade textures of Bradley’s wheezing harmonium. When the Sherwood sister’s recorders, as in tune as they would ever be, hit the sweet spot with Hinton’s screaming vocal, the result was often devastating. Side one featured a complex song-suite in which Hinton re-imagines Hearn as a kind of Arthurian estate-agent who, when Camelot comes onto the market, gains heroic status by passing on a sealed bid from Arthur (at the behest of Lancelot) thus ensuring the King’s rightful place at the Round Table.

During recording, Hinton and Fisher had formed a romantic attachment but while the album drew widespread local acclaim, living and working in such close proximity at ‘Otter’s Holt’ put strains upon the relationship leading to the band’s break-up in 1974.

Penny Hinton has long since abandoned music and now provides responsibly sourced driftwood craft items for the offices of corporate clients. She never did speak to Simon Hearn and, despite her many relationships and affairs, still maintains that he was the one true love of her life. The rest of the band also withdrew from the business and, having married soon after the split, Bren and Bryony Bradley opened a bridal-wear boutique. Bryony’s sister Jeanine helps out on Saturdays.

Through dappled light at first we saw
Fair Camelot’s glittering tower
The master chamber, deep within
Replete with en-suite shower
Wise King of Avalon,
I tell thee, open up your coffer,
For a hundred coins of shining gold
‘tis yours (or nearest offer)

from ‘The Completion of Arthur’, The Chine

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