Music

Traditional and contemporary folk songs are at the heart of what we do - harmonies, original arrangements, some unaccompanied, some from the troubadour tradition of mediæval France.

We love the way that traditional songs are not stuck in the past - they're constantly reinvented. The challenge is creating something original:  a new arrangement of an old song, a new combination, a modern song which finds its place amongst those sung for generations.


 

Singing the year around: The turning of the year, the traditions of the land and the natural world.

Our second CD The Dance Goes On is a 'concept album' (remember those?!) about the changing seasons. It features traditional songs such as May carols and songs of winter customs like the Wren Hunt, with some original songs, often by little-known songwriters.


Exotic hybrids

One of our specialities is combining the English and Welsh traditions. We've created some unique arrangements; melding Welsh songs with English songs which have related themes, resulting in exotic hybrids which offer an unusual take on both traditions.

Here are two from our first album, Sorta Kinda: first Early Spring in Llangyfelach, which combines the English So Early, Early In The Spring with the Welsh Ffarwel i Langyfelach Lon


and next, the semi-autobiographical Tell Me My Love/Ffoles Llantrisant.


 

Songs for listening, songs for dancing 

French dancing is mostly couple dances, and if you think of French café waltzes you won't be far off, though there's much more to it than that. Breton dance is mostly in circles and spirals; the simple ones accessible and trancey, the more complex ones energetic and requiring nifty footwork.

Singing for dancing is pure joy and we perform both Breton and French material. MADE events at Kinnersley Castle are a regular haunt, but we're also to be found singing for French dance clubs around the UK (PentreFfestNoz in Cardiff, D'Accord! in Exeter, Horsley French Dance Club, near Stroud) as well as abroad (Festiv'Allier and Gennetines in France, or Freiburg French dance club pictured here).