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Many of this year’s staff have taught in past Welsh Heritage Week courses, and we are happy to welcome them back.
We’re also pleased to welcome a few new teachers to the group. All of the teachers are native Welsh speakers who teach our language classes as well as teaching their specialties.
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John Albert Evans, Lead Teacher
John Albert is the Lead Teacher for Welsh Heritage Week.
He has been with WHW since 1988 and has been Language Director since 1990. Retired after 20 years as Welsh Language Organizer for Mid-Glamorgan, he now freelances as a schools inspector and serves as the Welsh language officer for the Rhondda Cynon Taf County Council. In addition, he teaches the Welsh
language to politicians and high-level civil servants.
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Gareth Hughes Jones , Singing
Gareth is an accomplished musician of considerable repute.
He conducted the acclaimed Cor Meibion Caernarfon (Caernarfon Male Choir) for many years, appearing with them at the 1988 National Gymanfa Ganu in Baltimore. A former producer for Sain Records and a school music teacher he is currently Administrator of the William Mathias College of Music. With only a few “misses,” Gareth has been a core staff member at WHW since 1989.
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Eiry Palfrey, Welsh Literature & Recitation
Eiry is known as actress, raconteur, writer, producer and astrologer in Wales and beyond. Welsh audiences will
remember her as announcer and news reader for HTV Wales, later cast as Helen Ambrose in the popular S4C soap opera ‘Dinas’. For many years she was the resident astrologer on Heno, and Radio Cymru and on the BBC website Cymru a’r Byd. More recently she has been touring America as an exponent of poetry with triple harpist Robin Huw Bowen and singer Heather Jones to thunderous applause.
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Rhod & Chris Jones, Folk Dance
Rhod and Chris Jones are directors of the award-winning folk dance group, Cwmni Dawns Werin Caerdydd, as well as being leaders in the Welsh Folk Dance Society. They are both educators and native Welsh speakers. We are very happy they will be back with us this year.
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Huw Roberts, Music Session
Huw, a native of Ynys Mon (Anglesey) earns his living as a deputy head teacher at a primary school on the island but is best known for his boundless enthusiasm for Welsh traditional music, dance and costume. Along with Robin Huw Bowen he is a member of the ‘up and coming’ Welsh Triple Harp choir Rhes Ganol and is a national winner on the old traditional harp of his country. His interest in the harping tradition on Anglesey prompted him a few years ago to co-author a book on the subject. Huw is also one of Wales’ most well known fiddle players and with his wife Bethan, leads the influential folk dance group Ffidl Ffadl. Within this context he has become an authority on the traditional folk costumes of Wales. He also plays the ancient crwth and pibgorn. Over the years, Huw has attended a number of Welsh Heritage courses both in Wales and in the United States/Canada.
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Robin Huw Bowen, Harp
Robin Huw Bowen is the foremost player of the uniquely Welsh triple harp, as well as a campaigner for its revival and manager of his own record company and press. He is
well-known for his performances in the US, both as a soloist and most recently a member of the band Crasdant.
Robin began his pursuit of the Welsh triple harp in 1980 while employed at the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth. Robin’s repertoire closely reflects that of the Welsh harp in its heyday (mid-17th to the end of the 19th century), and his playing and interpretation of the music continue the unbroken tradition of Welsh harp music.
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