Wales - The Middle and Southwest

Before leaving North Wales, I realise we should have stopped in Wrexham, where 2 of the members of The Trials of Cato come from, the third being from Yorkshire.  The band actually formed in Beirut, where they were teaching English and there is a bit of a Middle Eastern flavour to their folk.  They have been dubbed the Sex Pistols of folk and their 2018 debut album Hide and Hair has caused quite a stir winning the BBC Radio 2 Folk Award for best of album.  Here's the opening track of this album, called Diffyrwch:

Brother and sister Roy and Linda Griffiths and their neighbour John Gittins from the village of Meifod in Mid-Wales formed the Welsh language folk group Plethyn, which was most active between 1978 and 1995.  They specialise in close harmony singing of the plygain tradition, which is based on a traditional Welsh Christmas service.  The name of the group means braid or bond.  This is the title song from their 1994 album Seidir Ddoe (yesterday's cider):

Based in Llanybydder near Lampeter in southwest Wales are Celtic folk group Ffynnon.  They have a contemporary take on traditional material with some Jazzy influences at times.  This is a song from their 2006 album Celtic Music fom Wales called Beth yw'r Haf:

From the Clettwr Valley in the Ceredigion region of West Wales hails Owen Shiers who started a project to reclaim some of the traditional music of his area and recording some of it under the name Cynefin.  They are some beautifully crafted Welsh language songs.  The debut album was launched this year called Dilyn Afon, Follow the River.   Here's a song from this album called Y Fwyalchen Ddu Bigfelen (The Yellow-Beaked Blackbird):

Now for something a bit different again with some Indie Rock from Carmathen in the shape of young, all-female trio Adwaith (Reaction).  They only launched in 2015 by Hollie Singer and Gwenllian Anthony, who have been friends since they were 3 years old, and who are joined by drummer Heledd Owen.  They are proudly Welsh and proudly feminist with all their lyrics in Welsh.  In their short career they have already been awarded with the Welsh Music Prize last November.  Here's a song from their only album to date, Melyn, recorded in 2018.  The song is called Fel i Fod (not sure what it means...):

Welsh harpist Catrin Finch from Llan-non apparently was the official harpist to the Prince of Wales from 2000-2004.  I didn't know anybody needed an official harpist, but there you go.  If anybody would like to apply to become my official harpist, please comment below... Some of her most exciting work has been when she collaborated with other world musicians such as Senegalese kora player Seckou Keita and Colombian dance band Cimarrón.  First up from her 2009 live album with Cimarrón, Yn Byw.  The song is called Quitapesares.  Have you ever heard the harp played like that?  And the dance steps towards the end are something else!

Next up the opening track from her 2018 album Soar with Seckou Keita called Clarach:

That's it for today from Wales.  We'll conclude our short tour of Wales next time in the southeast of the country.  As usual you can follow my virtual exploits on my tripline map.