Masefield’s work spanned more than sixty years. His skills – rhythms and rhymes, ballads, dramatic narratives, sonnets – and his interests, including Ancient Rome, the sea, nature and country ways, may have fallen out of fashion, but are undeniable. His lines on ageing find an echo: ‘my dog and I too old for roving’ and his plea ‘may love’s gold coin be current with us yet.’ Ronald Pickup matches all the poet’s moods.

This appears to be the first recording of a Masefield collection since the poet’s own LPs in the late 1950s and early 60s. The now unfashionable long narrative poems are only excerpted here, but the selection of Masefield’s shorter works is well considered. It includes Sea Fever, of course, but there’s a great range of tone in the rest. Ronald Pickup finds the right voice for each type of poem – from the rough countryman for Saul Kane’s Madness to the elegiac note of the WWI sonnets. The arrangement is (with one exception) chronological, so the listener can follow the evolution of this UK poet laureate’s work and style.