Welsh traditional music
Орехово-Зуевский Государственный Педагогический Институт
Кафедра английского языка
Реферат по страноведению на тему:
Welsh traditional music
Выполнила студентка
5 курса 502а группы
английского отделения
Андрианова Т.В.
Преподаватель:
Абульханов Р.А.
Орехово-Зуево
2002
Contents:
1. The peculiarities of folk music in Wales…………………………………..3
2. Plethyn……………………………………………………………………..6
3. Boys of the Lough…………………………………………………………7
4. Rag Foundation…………………………………………………………….8
5. Fernhill……………………………………………………………………..9
6. The renaissance of Welsh traditional music……………………………….12
1.The peculiarities of folk music in Wales
Wales is the only Celtic nation with a completely unbroken tradition
of harp music, where the music, technique, and style have been passed down
orally from harper to harper over the centuries. Wales is best known for
its large-ensemble choral singing. But this principality lying along
Britain's southwestern shore also has a proud Celtic tradition of smaller,
more tightly knit bands that perform native instrumentals and folk songs.
Wales is a land of song, sung either by male voice choirs or crowds at
rugby matches. But there has been singing of all manner of songs in all
manner of places, from the Canu'r Pwnc chanting of scripture in chapel to
the scurrilous rhymes sung in pubs. All that is commonly known about Welsh
poetry is that it comes in forms of mind-boggling complexity. But there is
a great variety of metre and tone. Bands such as Pigyn Clust are mining
these veins in new and startling ways, juxtaposing melodies, and verse
forms.
In Ireland and Scotland, because traditional music is better
established, the orthodoxies too are stronger. While musicians improve
technically - and there are some phenomenally accomplished players and
singers - there is little innovation, beyond often misguided collaborations
with musicians from incompatible traditions. If the Chieftains finally
stopped coming to town then a similar band playing similar music would soon
fill the vacuum - Lunasa, for instance. Should Aly Bain, the Boys of the
Lough's fiddler, lay down his bow then Catriona MacDonald would step in.
But in Wales musicians are rediscovering, recreating and
reinterpreting their traditional music, which is crucial to the development
of their culture. Of all the Celtic countries it is Wales where the
traditional music is most interesting and most vital.
The bardic and eisteddfod traditions have long dominated Welsh music
and, partly as a result, the Celtic music boom which propelled Irish,
Scots, Breton and even Galician music into the international spotlight,
somehow left Wales behind. Several excellent artists have made inroads
through the years, notably the harp-playing brothers Dafydd and Gwyndaf
Roberts of Ar Log, the singer/harpist Sian James, 70s group Plethyn and
fiery dance band Calennig.
The Welsh have a drastically different style of playing, largely due
to the nature of the music itself. Their music is ornamented through theme
and variation, a more classical style, rather than through the sort of
ornamentation heard in Scottish and Irish music. Due to this love of
Baroque-like style, the Welsh adopted the triple harp as their national
instrument, taking advantage of the three rows of strings to play a wide
variety of variations on traditional Welsh melodies. (Triple-strung harps
have two diatonic rows on either side, and a row of accidentals up the
middle, which the harper plays by reaching between the outer strings to
play).
The harp is of course the instrument most closely
identified with Wales. But though it's accorded the highest respect there,
the fiddle and the accordion are perhaps embraced with greater affection.
CDs sampling the traditions of both have recently been released, but for
many listeners these will be introductions rather than surveys. The
squeezebox anthology Megin (bellows) is especially good. The range of
repertoire, and even instruments, is remarkable, from the robust melodeon
dance music of Meg and Neil Browning from North Wales to John Morgan
(clearly influenced by harp players) whose duet concertina combines the
gravitas of a church organ with the delicacy of a flute. The inclusive
nature of this selection is significant too; players from the south-
eastern, urban, (post-) industrial region rub shoulders with those from the
Marches, the rural and largely English-speaking area running along the
border. It even includes the Brecon Hornpipe and Dic y Cymro played by John
Kirkpatrick - the most famous of English box players who lives on the
eastern side, in Shropshire. So the CD draws on and expresses the complex
reality and the richness of Wales, recognising that music will not be
confined by city nor countryside, language nor national boundary.
Those instrumental traditions were not well known, and the
fiddle certainly suffered in the religious revivals of the 19th century,
when many were burned. But at least they did not disappear completely. The
bray harp, the instrument of medieval bards, then the peasants of South
Wales, and bagpipes - of which there were various local kinds - were not so
fortunate. Tunes and references to players remain and in recent years Ceri
Rhys Matthews and Jonathan Shorland have recreated bagpipes and researched
their repertoires, while William Taylor has reconstructed the smaller bray
harp. Such enterprises are academically fraught, but musically very
exciting. That there are no masters from whom to learn the nuances of
phrasing, accent and the trick of grace-notes - those details of
performance which distinguish traditional music - is a grave loss, but it
does give the contemporary musician enviable freedom.
Ned Thomas had noted in his revelatory book The Welsh Extremist that
'when two Welsh speakers meet the topic of conversation is the state of the
language'. What Welsh traditional music was played tended to serve the
cause of a culture in crisis, rather than express it. So like a cramped
toenail, it grew inward. "Between about 1980 and 1990 there was almost no
awareness of what was going on elsewhere," a Welsh musician recently told
me. "Wales became Albania."
In modern times a whole gamut of outstanding bands are making
their presence felt, including The Kilbride Brothers, Rag Foundation,
Aberjaber and folk-rock band Blue Horses, Fernhill.
2. Plethyn
This trio from Powys in mid-Wales, together for 25 years, are
celebrated for close vocal harmonies laid over a spare instrumental mix of
guitar, mandolin, tin whistle and concertina. Siblings Linda Healy and Roy
Griffiths, along with their friend John Gittins, have pioneered a more
intimate singing style, based on the Plygain choral tradition. Nowhere is
that more apparent than in Plethyn's a cappella rendition of the Welsh
traditional song "Cainc Yr Aradwr" ("The Ploughboy's Song"), from this
outstanding 1994 album, whose title is Welsh for "Yesterday's Cider."
3. Boys of the Lough
Boys of the Lough are one of the past masters of celtic music,
combining members from several celtic traditions with a long history; where
other celtic groups last a few years, the Boys are now in their third
decade and retain two of their earliest members. Like that other long-
running act the Chieftans, their music tends to the formal; impeccable
technique and sensitivity, with large, sometimes classical-style
arrangements, and very tight ensemble playing. They lack the fire and
roughness of other groups; the overall feeling is of a group of skilled,
well-integrated musicians playing together for the pure pleasure of it.
The history of the Boys has several twists and turns. The group was
formed in 1967, as a trio of Cathal McConnell, Tommy Gunn of Fermanagh and
Robin Morton from Portadown. Tommy Gunn later dropped out and the remaining
duo recorded "An Irish Jubliee" in 1969. At the sametime, Shetland fiddler
Aly Bain and singer/guitarist Mike Whelans were playing on the Scottish
folk circuit. The two duos met up at the Falkirk folk festival where they
played together and some time later, in 1971 came together for good. Dick
Gaughan of Leith replaced Mike in 1972 and this lineup recorded the first
'official' group album in 1972. Dick, in turn, left in 1973 and was
replaced by Dave Richardson of Northumberland, bringing in new instruments
including, cittern, banjo and mandolin. This lineup continued for several
year, touring widely in Europe and America and releasing 6 albums, two of
them recorded live. Live at Passim's was recorded at Passim's in Cambridge,
Massachusetts, and Wish You Were Here comes from a tour of the Scottish
Highlands and Islands. Robin Morton left in 1979 and was replaced with Dave
Richardson's brother, Tich, on guitar. Tich was killed in a road accident
in late 1983. After some time, the band came together again with new
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