Alun Guy is a very experienced and well respected figure in the Welsh music world. He has conducted various choirs throughout Wales, and has sat on the music panel of the National Eisteddfod for the past 20 years. He currently works as a musical advisor to schools and is Chief Examiner of Music GCSE for the WJEC in Wales.
This is one of a series of glossy forty-page booklets on various
aspects of Welsh life. Gomer have commissioned a different author
for each publication and celebrities contribute a brief foreword.
Great Welsh Voices focuses on the contemporary music scene and Alun
Guy discusses most of ‘the usual suspects’: Rebecca Evans, Bryn
Terfel, Dennis O’Neill, Meic Stevens, Shân Cothi, Katherine Jenkins
and Caryl Parry Jones. The only Male Voice Choir represented is the
Pontarddulais choir. Mr Guy could have helped to restore the
balance between north and south Wales with a few words on the
achievements of the Froncysyllte choir. He also appears to find it
puzzling that Dylan Thomas failed to include a choir in Under Milk
Wood but does not make it clear why he feels this to be an
omission. (While we are on the subject of omissions, one wonders
why there is no reference to Shirley Bassey in the publication.)
The photographs chosen as illustrative material are first-rate.
*Dewi Roberts @ www.gwales.com*
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