Nancy Kerr along the Kennet and Avon Canal

For twelve years, the singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Nancy Kerr lived on a narrow boat, travelling the length and breadth of England’s inland waterways. As she walks on the towpath with Matthew Bannister, she tells how the experience inspired many of her songs – and performs two of them: “Queen of Waters” and “Tiller Song”. Nancy explains that folk music was part of her upbringing, with her mother Sandra Kerr a well-known performer and her father a Northumbrian pipe player. Did she ever fall in to the canal? “Yes, about once a month!”