Saturday, August 09, 2008

Rain fails to stop play

I spent this afternoon looking after Rhiannon in a very wet corner of the Leamington Spa shopping centre, where her mum and dad were playing a marathon gig with their band 'Lament' from 11.00-4.00, as part of a local festival. They had a gazebo in the corner of a courtyard opposite two coffee shops side by side, to contain and protect all five band members and their equipment. It was a tight fit, and rained for four of the five hours they played, but they went on, quite undaunted, and produced some amazingly tight and exciting music. Some of their new songs I hadn't heard before, so it was quite a special occasion, having a little time with my lovely grand-daughter, with mum and dad making music in the rain in the background.

Clare rang up from the Eistedfod Maes, back in Cardiff, where she'd been attending competitions and the closing ceremony. She was full of the excitement of the occasion, and in the background, I could hear over the phone Pontarddulais Male Voice choir singing spontaneously together in the rain, in the modest area of the field devoted to fast food and beer.

Well, none of massive volume of rain that Cardiff can seemingly throw at any major event served to dampen the spirits, or diminish the attendance. 150,000 were hoped for, nearly 157,000 showed up over the week. And to cap it all, the Bardic Chair was awarded to a female poet for only the second time in the history of the Gorsedd. It's seventy years since the Chair was last awarded in a National Eisteddfod in Cardiff. On two previous occasions an Eisteddfod was held in the city, no entry was deemed good enough. So, if a woman can break the Cardiff Eisteddfod jinx, what might a woman do for the jinxed Anglican episcopate?

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