Elizabeth McGovern: Lady Cora turns to rock'n'roll – but don't expect youthful rage and heartbreak The Downton Abbey actress came late to music but says it is her passion ADAM SHERWIN SATURDAY 14 JULY 2012 (THE INDEPENDENT)

As Lady Cora, the Downton Abbey heiress, Elizabeth McGovern has a central role in a television drama phenomenon. But the American actress said she would give it all up to jump in the back of a van and go on tour with her late-blooming rock'n'roll band.

Tomorrow afternoon, McGovern will trudge through the Hyde Park mud and lead her group, Sadie and the Hotheads, on to the Rising Stage for new talent, at the Hard Rock Calling Festival, headlined by Paul Simon.

The Oscar-nominated actress, 50, first picked up a guitar only 10 years ago, and her songs dwell on the mixture of domestic contentment and frazzled chaos that comes with being a middle-aged, middle-class mother with two teenage daughters.

"My songs are not filled with rage and heartbreak," McGovern told The Independent. "They are observations from looking at my life and the people around me. They come from a mature perspective."

Sadie and the Hotheads have recorded an album which will be a "self-help" guide for parents driven to distraction by life's trials . "It's called How Not To Lose Things. It's like a self-help book for people who have to juggle so many balls," said McGovern, who lives in London with husband Simon Curtis, a film director.

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