Posts Categorized: News

The Audio Archive

Posted & filed under Archive 'Tent', Featured, Llangollen Online, News.

There have been audio recordings since the first Llangollen Eisteddfod in 1947. In the part of our Archive currently held in the LIME Pavilion, we have a recording of the Coedpoeth Youth Choir singing ‘Robin Ddiog’ (or ‘Lazy Robin’) during the 1947 Eisteddfod. The sound quality is not brilliant, but for just over a minute, we go back in time, and listen to this young group entertaining their audience, which erupts in applause at the end.

A festival based around music was bound to try to capture the essence of what was being performed by the choirs, instrumental groups and soloists taking part, and by the great artistes and orchestras invited along as guests. The earliest recordings take the form of 78 rpm discs, usually of individual choirs. These were often provided courtesy of the BBC from its Llangollen broadcasts. Most recordings in the LIME Archive consist of reel-to-reel audio tapes made year by year at each Eisteddfod, which preserve the entries at each of the competitions. These are listed as ‘Official Audio Recordings’ made on behalf of the Eisteddfod. More recent audio formats, such as the audio cassette and the CD, have been used in later years and have frequently been made available to the public through sales at outlets on the Eisteddfod field.

Some of these recordings are still retained in the LIME Pavilion, but the majority have been deposited over the years at the Denbighshire Archive in Ruthin. One of the aims of our current Archive Project is to digitise these recordings so that they become accessible to enquirers and researchers from across the world.

A small selection of accessible recordings has already been made, and a playlist created, which is available to hear in the Archive Tent during each Eisteddfod Week. We hope to build on the work done already, and to create an audio archive which will preserve much of the Llangollen Eisteddfod’s musical heritage for posterity.

Alan

Alan Tiltman
Archives Committee

Archiving the Past

Posted & filed under Archive 'Tent', Featured, Llangollen Online, News.

We were looking forward to meeting you all at this year’s Eisteddfod and sharing our vision for the Archiving the Past project. As this is sadly not possible, we have put together a number of blogs to create a virtual Archive Tent this year to tell you more about it.

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Llangollen Online presents special message from HRH The Prince of Wales plus online premiere of Global Peace Message as part of ‘Eisteddfod Week’ programme

Posted & filed under Featured, Llangollen Online, News.

Last month, we launched ‘Llangollen Online’ #connectingtheworld, a digital offering to bring together our global community following the postponement of this year’s festival. Next week, in what would have been ‘Eisteddfod Week’, we have a programme of online activity to give a flavour of the International Eisteddfod to the many participants and visitors who usually descend on our picturesque Denbighshire town each July.

Prince Charles at the Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod dancing with Sheerer Punjabi Dancers

On Tuesday 7 July, to open the week, there will be a special message from LIME’s patron, HRH The Prince of Wales. It continues a long relationship between The Prince of Wales and the International Eisteddfod, which he has visited three times. During the most recent visit in 2015, The Prince was famously coaxed into dancing with members of a Punjabi bhangra group from Nottingham, the Sheerer Punjabi Dancers, as he waved off the traditional Parade of Nations.

On Thursday 9 July, as part of the festival’s traditional ‘Peace Day’, online audiences will be treated to the premiere of a Global Peace Message. The main feature will be a relayed spoken word performance of a specially commissioned poem, Harmoni a Heddwch, written by Mererid Hopwood. Those taking part in the message include LIME President Terry Waite plus children from Ysgol Rhostyllen, St Giles School Wrexham and Ysgol Dinas Bran. The online premiere will also present the first performance of a new piece of music, sung by Wrexham soprano, Elan Catrin Parry, with words by Hopwood and music by Edward-Rhys Harry.

Edward-Rhys Harry, Artistic Director of LIME, says “We are delighted to open the week on Tuesday with a message from HRH The Prince of Wales. With Tuesday traditionally being our Children’s Day, we will also have the online premiere of our Children’s Day Message of Peace, elements of which will be included in our Global Peace Message on Thursday.

This is the first time we have ever done anything like this and we are all so excited to be able to share it online with our international community. It has been amazing to have Mererid Hopwood create a new poem for us that has captured the essence of our festival, and we have been overwhelmed by the generosity of others who have given their time to help us create Llangollen Online. We feel very humbled and grateful and hope people enjoy the ‘flavour of Llangollen’ this year.”

Mererid Hopwood is a Welsh poet, who in 2001 became the first woman ever to win the bardic Chair at the National Eisteddfod, the Crown in 2003 and the Prose Medal in 2008. She was the Bardd Plant (Children’s Poet) in 2005. Nes Draw, her first collection of poetry won the 2016 Wales Book of the Year Welsh Poetry category and was selected to the Wales Literature Exchange 2016 Bookcase. She is currently Professor of Languages and the Welsh Curriculum at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David.

Over the past 4 weeks, people have been voting via Llangollen.TV for their favourite performances and moments from the last 25 years, from footage showcasing performers from 57 different countries and well over 10,000 competitors. Tens of thousands of people have voted in five categories and the winners will be announced live on S4C’s daily show Prynhawn Da as well as on Llangollen.TV every day during what would have been Llangollen 2020’s ‘Eisteddfod Week’ from Tuesday 7 to Saturday 11 July.

The week will also include the Young Peacemakers Awards, in association with the Welsh Centre for International Affairs (WCIA), an online premiere of the Children’s Day Message by Chris Dukes with local school children from Ysgol Bryn Collen, Llangollen and St Joseph’s Catholic & Anglican High School, Wrexham, and competitor messages from across the globe.

‘Eisteddfod Week’ will culminate in a 90 minute documentary on S4C on Sunday 12 July at 7.30pm, featuring some of the most memorable moments from the past 25 years.

Audiences can relive Llangollen 2019 with a special broadcast of last year’s highlights programme to be shown on BBC TWO Wales on Sunday 12 July at 6.30pm.

*****

Key Moments for the Week
Online Premiere: Children’s Day Message – Tuesday 7 July at 11am on YouTube/Website
Young Peacemakers Awards: Thursday 9 July on Website
Online Premiere: Global Peace Message – Thursday 9 July at 11am on YouTube/Website
Online Vote Winners: S4C’s Prynhawn Da, Tue-Fri, 2pm, Llangollen.TV Tue-Sat , 2pm
2019 Highlights – BBC TWO Wales, Sunday 12 July 2020, 6.30pm
Special Documentary – on S4C , Sunday 12 July 2020 at 7.30pm

Free to view across the follow digital platforms

Llangollen.net
Llangollen.TV
YouTube/Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod
S4C/ S4C Click

Jobs: Board of Trustees Vacancies

Posted & filed under Featured, News.

Are you passionate about arts and culture? Would you like to use your skills and expertise to make a real difference as a Trustee?

Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod is looking for new trustees to join our board as we prepare to revision for the future. At this exciting and pivotal moment, we wish to strengthen and diversify our board, who have ultimate responsibility for the strategic direction, development and governance of our organisation.

We currently have vacancies for-

Company Secretary – this is a key role in ensuring the effective functioning of the board and compliance with regulatory requirements.

Trustees – we are particularly interested in hearing from individuals with experience in: Marketing, Media & PR, Enterprise/Business Development, IT/Systems, Strategic Planning, Digital Technology, International Networks and Advocacy.

We encourage and welcome applications from individuals from all backgrounds and communities, especially applications from black and minority ethnic communities and other under-represented groups.

For further information about the roles, and how to apply please visit our jobs page here.

International Eisteddfod announces Llangollen Online

Posted & filed under Featured, Llangollen Online, News.

#ConnectingtheWorld
1 June – 11 July 2020

The Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod (LIME) is delighted to announce Llangollen Online #connectingtheworld, which will be free to view and runs from today until 11 July, to ensure we are staying home together but continue to promote a connected international community during the current difficult times.

In March, the International Eisteddfod announced the postponement of 2020’s festival due to the global pandemic of COVID-19. Determined to give an International Eisteddfod experience, it was clear that there needed to be some way for our international community of participants, performers, visitors and volunteers to stay connected and come together through these hard times.

LIME Artistic Director, Edward-Rhys Harry said: “It felt vital to bring our global community together to share music and dance and of course, continue a message of peace and harmony. Normally at this time of year, our staff, volunteers and local community are working full speed to deliver the festival, and we have also had lots of messages from overseas participants telling us how much they are missing us and the experience. So in some way we wanted to be able to connect and share on a different platform this year as best we can.”

From today (1 June) working in collaboration with media partners, Rondo Media, audiences will be able to watch competitions and vote online for their favourite moment via the Llangollen.TV platform. The archive footage will be presented in five categories: Mixed, Chamber and Youth Choirs; Single Voice and Barbershop Choirs; Children’s Choirs; Folk Groups and Choirs; and Adult and Youth Dance. Vote winners in each category will be announced daily during Eisteddfod week (7-11 July).

Gareth Williams, Rondo Media said “Over the past few weeks, we’ve been going through the Eisteddfod archive which includes 25 years of footage showcasing performers from 57 different countries and well over 10,000 competitors. In 2019, leading up to Eisteddfod week, we held an online voting competition to find the Choir of the World Champions. It proved to be hugely popular and so we knew there was appetite amongst our core International Eisteddfod audiences for something similar. We have also been working with S4C for many years to share the International Eisteddfod with audiences beyond Llangollen and across the whole of Wales. Combining online competitions with the documentary felt like a good way to give a Llangollen Eisteddfod experience with a difference during these difficult times globally.”

During Eisteddfod week, audiences can look forward to new content to complement the archive footage. This includes Heddwch a Harmoni: Byd gwâr yw ein byd o gân, lines by renowned Welsh poet, Mererid Hopwood, which focus on the Eisteddfod’s founding principles, namely the aim of bringing international communities together in peace and harmony.

Edward-Rhys Harry said, “There is a whole host of activity surrounding this, on Tuesday, the Peace Message will be children and youth-centric, so will, in effect, replace the Children’s Day message this year. The Thursday message will be centred around several major events: a message from our President Terry Waite, the new commission by Mererid Hopwood, who will help narrate this, along with a number of our volunteers, children and other participants, and a song of peace and hope.”

Voting opens today on Llangollen.TV and closes on 30 June 2020. More details of the programme and events will be released over the coming weeks.

 

Llangollen Online  – presented in partnership with Rondo Media 

Llangollen.TV 2020 is sponsored by Linguassist