The Welsh have been combining harp music and spoken word for hundreds of years. Folk tales and poetry combined with music are reminiscent of an evening's entertainment in the days before television. Robin Huw Bowen, joined by the actress Eiry Palfrey and singer/guitarist Heather Jones offer a taste of Welsh culture and music. This Christmas celebration demonstrates a love of both music and language from the perspecive of a small rural Celtic country where the English are always present but their own traditions and language have survived.
The centerpiece of this CD is Dylan Thomas' A Child's Christmas in Wales. Other poems and stories show the listeners what the holidays were like 50 years ago in Wales, when the children's Christmas play had to have a few extra wise men and the rooster did not get eaten for Christmas dinner. When Robin and Eiry perform The Twelve Days of Christmas, the recipient of the gifts gives a running commentary on her changing life style, as the gifts pile up in her house. In between the stories and poems there are tunes from Robin Huw Bowen, master of the Welsh national instrument, the triple harp.
Robin Huw Bowen & Eiry Palfrey
12/7/01
by Jon Hartley Fox
www.cityfolk.org
In one of his best loved works, "A Child's Christmas In Wales," the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas wrote, "Always on Christmas night there was music." He fondly remembered a fiddle-playing uncle, a family- uncles, aunts and cousins-gathered around to sing the old songs, with lots of laughter, and a special once-a-year kind of warmth. Thomas' classic holiday reminiscence forms the centerpiece of tonight's program, "Christmas in Wales," but it is only one of many seasonal treats on this evening's bill of fare.
Like the Christmas remembered by Dylan Thomas, tonight's festive celebration of Welsh Christmases past and present includes traditional music, singing, stories, carols and tales for the entire family. This warm-hearted holiday fantasia is charmingly brought to life by two of Wales' most acclaimed traditional performers old friends and frequent collaborators Eiry Palfrey and Robin Huw Bowen.
Eiry Palfrey started her performing career on the Eisteddfod circuit in Wales and captured several awards at national level for the performance of poetry. She became a professional actress in 1973 and has appeared in several leading roles in theatre, television and film. More recently, Palfrey has concentrated on producing documentaries, folk entertainment and arts programs for television. However, she has remained true to her first love -- the presenting of poetry and Welsh folk tales (both humerous and serious) to live audiences. She has performed with many celebrated Welsh musicians and singers, including having an established performing relationship with Bowen. Palfrey can be heard on a recorded release with folk group Mabsant.
Robin Huw Bowen is universally heralded as one of the greatest traditional musicians in Welsh history. Bowen is the undisputed modern master of the Welsh triple harp, a rare, difficult-to-play instrument that serves as the national symbol of Wales. Through nearly 20 years of performing and recording (both as a solo act and with Welsh groups), his five solo recording, and his groundbreaking research into the musical history and traditions of Wales. Bowen's influence has been far-reaching. His importance to Welsh music was officially recognized at the Machynlleth Festival in 2000 when Bowen receiverd the prestigious Glyndwr Award for "an outstanding contribution to the arts in Wales."
Bowen was born into a Welsh-speaking family from Anglesey in the north of Wales. Though he was born and raised in Liverpool, England-which many jokingly call the "unofficial capital of North Wales" because of its large Welsh community-Bowen grew up in a throughly Welsh home. Not only did his family speak Welsh at home, they also attended Welsh religious services ("every Sunday-home from home") and lived an essentially Welsh life within the larger enclave.
Despite this solid grounding in the traditional life of Wales, Bowen never encountered the Welsh triple harp while growing up, a telling comment on the rarity of the instrument at that time. Bowen's first exposure to the traditional harp music came at a Liverpool performance by Alan Stivell, a young harpist from the Breton region of France. The music so capitivated Bowen he determined on the spot to play the harp himself. Bowen started on the Celtic harp-as that was the instrument Stivell played-with the help of a few lessons from a local classical harpist.
Bowen soon went off to study Welsh language and literature at the University College of Aberystwyth, Mid-Wales. It was around that time that his "world turned upside-down" when he saw the Welsh band Ar Log, which featured the Welsh triple harp. Bowen was thunderstruck by the instrument, which was larger, louder, more complicated and sonically richer than the Celtic harp he was then playing. In an instant, Bowen recognized his destiny. In the next, he realized he was back at square one with his chosen isntrument.
At least he had good teachers. The harp-playing brothers in Ar Log, Dafydd and Gwyndaf Roberts, had learned directly from Nansi Richards, the last surviving harpist in the once-thriving Welsh Gypsy tradition. As the brothers learned from Richards, so Bowen learned from them, picking up old styles of playing techniques as well as the traditional tunes...
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