Dragon Tales online

February - June 2010

Page 9

2009 NAFOW

Stacy Evans

The 2009 North American Festival of Wales was held over Labor Day week-end at the Golden Triangle in the heart of Pittsburgh, PA.  Over 500 North American Welsh and guests from the UK attended an eventful week-end of seminars (including one of regional interest on the immigration of Welsh to coal mining areas), a fun-filled concert by the North American Welsh Choir, a grand banquet serenaded by tenor Gwyndaf Jones from Toronto, and two rousing sessions of the Sunday gymanfa ganu.

The Welsh-English worship service was led by Lord Roger Roberts, a Methodist minister from Llandudno in North Wales.  The gymanfa conductor was Eilir Owen Griffiths, the dynamic Welsh conductor of the previous year's choir CF1.  Of course, there was an eisteddfod competition which produced a David Morris Prize winner who will have an opportunity to compete in the 2010 National Eisteddfod of Wales.

One of the highlights was the folk singing concert on Thursday night that featured Dafydd Iwan and Ar Log.  It was a joyous sing-along with one of the legendary Welsh folk groups.

The setting of the Pittsburgh Hilton was perfect since it faces Fort Pitt Park where the opening ceremonies featured the Slater Band of Bangor, PA high school (from the Slate Belt of northeastern PA), dressed in uniforms reminiscent of the famed Welsh Guards.  The state park is the site of the coming together of the Monongahela and Allegheny rivers as they form the beginning of the 998-mile Ohio River.

The next North American Festival of Wales will be held this year on September 2-5, in Portland, Oregon, the City of Roses. Information about this year's event should be in the hands of local societies by St. David's Day.  Check the website at http://www.nafow.org.

From “The Granville Sentinel”

WSCO board member Stacy Evans made the front page of a local newspaper after a Sentinel reporter interviewed Stacy about his position as executive director of the Welsh National Gymanfa Ganu Association and the move, in 2009, of the WNGGA offices to Granville, OH.  The January 14, 2010 edition of the paper had a picture of Stacy displaying his happy Welsh smile, with a map of Wales in the background.

Folks in Granville are hoping that the presence of WNGGA’s office will help to spark interest in the Welsh heritage of Granville Township.

Stacy worked into the interview (and, hence, into print) the names of those great Welsh traditions eisteddfod and gymanfa ganu, along with phonetic pronunciations.

Another WSCO member, Maggie Brooks, is on the Granville Historical Society Board of Managers and gave a statement on behalf of the Historical Society.  WSCO folks who were bus trippers in October, 2007, may remember that Maggie hosted our tour of that society’s museum.

One of the other hosts on that 2007 bus tour met us at the Welsh Hills Baptist Church and was also quoted in the article -- Lloyd Philipps is a descendent of founding fathers of the Welsh Hills settlement in the township.

You can find the full text of the article (but no picture of Stacy!) online at www.newarkadvocate.com.  At the top of the home page to the right of center, use the Search All box; put “Welsh Granville” in the search box, click the Local News tab above that and then “go”; scroll down to find the article titled “Welsh association makes home here.”

Diolch to WSCO member David C. Jones for sending the article to Dragon Tales.

Other Events of Interest

2010, September 2-5 – North American Festival of Wales, Portland, OR www.nafow.org

2011, September – North American Festival of Wales, Cleveland, OH

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