folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: katlaughing
Date: 19 Jul 06 - 12:11 PM

Since I didn't realise she used a lot of real palce names, I didn't post as much in the first post as maybe I ought've. Here's a little bit mroe info on the setting:

Most of the mystery investigation centers around a town named "Salem," "Castle Woods," and "Snidey Castle Estate," also "Dorabella Quarry."

Oh, also, how would one pronounce the name "Eifion?"

Thanks,

Kat

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 19 Jul 06 - 12:38 PM

ay-veeon

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: 8_Pints
Date: 20 Jul 06 - 10:01 AM

Welsh has no letter 'V' so uses 'F' to give the same sound: 'FF' is a separate letter and is pronounced 'eff' equivalent to the English 'F'.

Confusing isn't it?

Bob vG

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: katlaughing
Date: 20 Jul 06 - 10:25 AM

Yes! It is! But, I am trying, so please keep educating, you all!:->

Thanks, Jon!

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 20 Jul 06 - 10:39 AM

Just to remind you of Snuffy's hint, kat. Also there is multimap. Multimap does turn up a Salem in N Wales which might fit with the Menai Straits. (see here).

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Jul 06 - 04:50 PM

I find the f and ff quite easy - we do it in Enlish with of and off. What I find realy confusing is the multiple consonants - Like dd (pronounced th) and twdd (pronounced tooth:-) ). Even more so the varying vowels. And if you have ever suffered from varying vowels you will know what I mean..;-)

Gi' us a quick lesson Sian:-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: BanjoRay
Date: 20 Jul 06 - 05:15 PM

In the nineteenth ane early twentieth century there was a climbing club in the Peak District called the Kyndwr Club - I wonder if that was from an old Welsh version of Kinder? It would mean something like "In front of the water" or maybe "the water at the front" which would correspond with Kinder Downfall, a superb waterfall dropping from the Kinder Plateau.
Ray

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 20 Jul 06 - 05:21 PM

A superb waterfall indeed, Ray, if there is any water about! Magnificent when the wind blows up from Hayfield and turns the waterfall back from where it came Even better when it freezes in the same circumstances. Trouble is you need to visit it at least 10 times to see it like that once! I must start doing it again:-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Paul Burke
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 03:47 AM

The name is pure English, and derives from some hiker who was caught by it as the wind was blowing the water about. Drenched to the skin and shivering, he named the waterfall "****'kin d-downfall!".

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: sian, west wales
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 04:25 AM

If 'kyn' is 'cwm' then 'kyndwr' would be the valley of the water - stream or lake, I would imagine.

'Dd' is 'th' as in 'this' not as in 'tooth'. 'Th' represents the sound in 'tooth'.

Vowels aren't really that difficult IF ... oh - I was going to say they aren't IF you can think in Welsh phonetics and try to forget everything you know about English phonetics BUT I have to admit that regional dialects throw a monkey wrench in those particular works.

Oh well - it's what makes languages interesting I guess. I started a Spanish-through-the-medium-of-Welsh class earlier this year. Now THAT's ... interesting.

sian

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 04:34 AM

DtG: The vowels do not vary (with the exception of 'y').However there are more of them, particularly if you include the accented ones.
a: as in cat
â: as in path (there again some pronounce path with the 'a' as in cat, so asking the English speaking to understand this is difficult!)
â: as in car (that's better!)
e: as in get, egg etc.,
i: as in tin, bin
o: as in got, dock
u: as ee in week or see
w: as oo in good
^w: as 'o' in womb. (the circumplex should be over the 'w', but that's not a stadard ASCII character)
y(1): as ea in tea, or as y in funny
y(2): as 'u' in pun, fun
To clarify the different pronunciations of 'y' I quote from the Collins-Spurrell learners dictionary.
Y(1) In monosyllables generally, and in final syllables
Y(2) In all but final syllables, and in y, yr(the),fy(my),dy(thy),yn, yng, ym (in), the adverbial yn, the preverbal and relative particle y, yr (y'm, y'th etc),syr (sir), nyrs (nurse)

Dipthongs, or double vowels, are pronounce with both vowel sounds as above, so for example au is pronounced as a(from cat) ee. which when spoken quickly together gets the sound 'eye'

All the above is relative, and there are pronunciation differences with Welsh accents (North, South & West Wales)

Any corrections later by Siân gratefully accepted

CHEERS (Hwyl Fawr)
Nigel

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 04:38 AM

And repeating Wysi's comment early in the thread,
Shouldn't this be above the line?
We need a pronunciation guide for Welsh songs.
Or would a separate thread with the knowledge gleaned from threads over the years be better?

CHEERS
Nigel

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Brian Peters
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 05:08 AM

>> If the mill town mentioned is indeed Glossop (which, on re-reading the first post, seems more and more likely), then the local accent is more Mancunian than Derbyshire. The true Derbyshire accent (found in the heart and east of the county), doesn't seem to me to be too different to Yorkshire; glottal stops replacing the word "the", and the 'A' sound dragged out to several seconds. <<

Huw, sounds like I've been living in Glossop about as long as you (24 years), but I'd say that when you hear a proper Glossop accent from an older native it's significantly different from Greater Mancunian. Certainly these people wouldn't be happy to hear they don't have a "true" Derbyshire accent. Of course it's not much like Erewash Valley "Eh Up Mi Duck" lingo either, but it's a lot softer than urban Manc. The Lancashire accent grades into Derbyshire around here, just as Yorkshire-speak does around Chesterfield.

>> Locally, though, the main accent encountered among the young is the slurred mixture of "rat-arsed" (drunk) and Mancunian. <<

Sadly true these days. Incidentally, I always thought there was a suspicion that the "vandals" who burned down various mills were not unconnected with developers wishing to cirmumvent Listed Building status. Or was that just a conspiracy theory?

>> I am practising a few Welsh tunes for the various informal sessions I attend. A "leek and daffodil" set might add nicely to the "Lurpak", "Bagel" and "Brie" sets many of the regular attendees do. <<

If one of those sessions is the Monday Globe, please note I'm hoping to persuade American concertina whizz Jody Kruskal to get down there on Monday next. So you might get some "Apple Pie" as well.

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Paul Burke
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 06:19 AM

In my experience, it's nothing like as simple as that... a friend brought up on Anglesey pronounces eu as eh-u where the u is like the German u-umlaut. Other people from only a few miles away pronounce it almost like 'eye'.

Reminds me of the friend of a friend who spent all day wandering round Wales looking for the village he could see on lots of signposts- Llwybr Cyhoeddus.

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 08:06 AM

I don't think you can drive there, Paul. I have only ever seen it on signs for public footpaths to it...

:D (tG)

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 08:34 AM

Can't think why that should be Dtg.

Subject: RE: BS: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Mr Happy
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 08:58 AM

Phlegmy-Gent?

Please use spittoon!!

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: katlaughing
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 01:34 PM

My tongue is really challenged by this thread!**bg** Thanks, again!!

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Mo the caller
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 06:55 PM

"Llwybr Cyhoeddus." ???
Tell us then.
(and how to say it if it's something we might need in a hurry)

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 21 Jul 06 - 07:24 PM

Public footpath, Mo

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: HuwG
Date: 22 Jul 06 - 03:49 AM

Local names around Glossop; Combes Edge, local name for the escarpment behind the village of Charlesworth.

Cwm, sometimes found elsewhere in English as "coombe" is also a cirque, French for the steep-sided vale which is also the birthplace of a glacier. Combes Edge certainly qualifies as one.

I'll keep looking, but as has been posted earlier, local inhabited place names follow Anglo-Saxon possessive names (e.g. Simmondley is presumably Simon's Ley, a "ley" being a clearing or enclosure), although a few do have non-possessive but definitely Anglo-Saxon descriptive names; Hayfield, Broadbottom.

Few Celtic descriptive names seem to have survived; there are no cefns (ridges), moels (hills), nants (streams) or coeds (woods, not nubile scholars !)

Welsh "oe" is pronounced as English "oi"; moel could be rendered as "moil" (or "mohel" ?), "coed" as "coid".

Tintwistle (locally pronounced "tinsel") might have a derivation from "Ty" (house), but "wistle" ? Nearby "Holybank" might also derive from "heol" street, but this refers only to a local quarry.

My incomplete reading of the history of the Peak District suggests that the Roman occupation of the area was quite as genocidal as anything else they managed (cf Tacitus's quote, "They made a desert and called it peace"). It is possible to surmise that they left nobody around to remember the Celtic names, although it is difficult to imagine that no culture moved back in during the 300 to 400 years before the Anglo-Saxons arrived. There are few traces of Roman occupation other than at Buxton (which they called Aquae Arnemetiae), and a fort near Gamesley, named Ardotalia but renamed Melandra Castle by Victorian fantasists, and in any case abandoned around 180 AD.

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST, Topsie
Date: 22 Jul 06 - 05:48 AM

"LLwybr" is presumably from the same root as "liberal" and "liberty" - i.e. a path that can be freely used.

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Jeff
Date: 22 Jul 06 - 11:42 AM

Hi Kat,

Have been following this thread for a while as I'm a welsh-american and interested in the history, culture and music of my heritage. There's a songbook called 'Blodnau'r Grug' which has 100 Welsh traditional folk dance tunes. Robin Huw Bowen(Welsh triple harpist) did the revision. The book is available in music stores(I got mine at a place called 'Gog's' in Llandudno), but the address of the publisher is: Andrew Bartholomew, 12 Rockwood Ave., Llandaf, Cardiff, UK, CF5 2NP.

Welsh Guitar by Michael Raven is another very good book/cd combination available. It's solo guitar and several of the tunes found in the above collection are contained in this one, too. It's available from: Michael Raven c/o Eve Raven, Yew Tree Cottage, Jug Bank, Ashley Market Drayton Shropshire TF9 4NJ Tel:[phone]

Sian James has a release called 'Gweini Tymor' which has a dozen or so songs sung only in Welsh. It's available from Sain Records which is located in Caenarfon...Kaye(as in the Scottish 'aye' meaning 'yes')nar-von though I don't know the address. A googlesearch would come up with any and all info, no doubt.

Hope this info is helpful as I've a special place in my heart for North Wales and have visited several times and intend a return visit early next year. Close friends teach at the St. David's College in Llandudno and I've done the session/open mic(Monday nights) at the Malt Loaf in Conwy a few times...always a pure joy.

If/when you visit be sure to stay at the youth hostel in Bangor as it's pretty centrally located and reasonabley priced. There's, also one in Rowan that's rural, a bit rougher, but completely delightful. And above all practice the correct pronunciation of Betws-y-coed. It's NOT 'Betsy-co-ed' like I said before being gently, but firmly corrected...'Bet00se-ah-coyd'. It's like being in NYC and pronouncing Houston St. as Hughston...the locals hate it.

One more suggestion if I may. Your choices are London, Liverpool, Manchester, etc. for flights, but I would highly recommend flying(550-900.00US-RdTr) into(and out of) Dublin from JFK(It's non-stop...6.5 hours...and arrives about 6:30AM local time). Take a taxi from the airport to the Stenna Line ferry in Dun Laoghaire(Pron: Done Leary(20-30mins@approx 30.00US). Ferry takes about 75-110 mins(depending on weather) to arrive in Holyhead(get a round trip ticket-approx 75.00US). Take the train to Bangor(3 blocks from the ferry...again round trip unless you return from elsewhere, of course) and a taxi to the IYH-Bangor or a BB of your choosing.

There's plenty or nothing to do as you choose. I stood for two hours at the window of my friends' townhouse in Trefriw(small village south of Conwy on the vale)and watched a sheppard w/a border collie and 2 pembroke corgis herd a small flock of sheep through 4-5 different fields. Was awestruck.

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 Jul 06 - 11:52 AM

I know all I keep saying is THANKS, but I really mean it, folks! This is so tremendously interesting and delightful AND so full of learning.

Jeff, thanks for such detailed info. I will definitely look into some of the music you mentioned. It will be a while before I can think of visiting over there, but it is wonderful to have first-hand info available. I have friends who both have cousins, aunties and uncles in Wales. They visited a few years ago and shared their adventures and photos with me. I know one of the places I would HAVE to visit is the National Library.

I am gald to say you have confirmed for me, I at least knew how to pronounce Caenarfon!:-)

Thanks, folks!!!

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Anne Lister
Date: 22 Jul 06 - 06:05 PM

And just to confuse the issue, here in Gwent as in the Cardiff area we have a distressing habit of pronouncing Welsh place names exactly as we please - most famously Caerphilly becomes Kerfilly (and don't worry about that double l sound!). My two favourites are Maesycwmmer, known to the locals as Massy, and Croesyceiliog, known locally as Crossy. And the wonderfully French named Fleur de Lys, known as Flower.
A friend did wonder why all the hotels were called Gwesty, though, and has been trying to spot the slow Arafs marked on the roads (are there any fast ones?).
Should we tell her?

Anne (in Pontypool)

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: katlaughing
Date: 22 Jul 06 - 06:59 PM

Oh, great, more to learn!LOL

I might've known...always do a search before starting a new thread. I was looking for an old thread, Mrs. Pavane Sings Welsh, to let you all know about it, in case you missed it the first time around (she does a BEE-YOU-TEE-FULL job, like my use of the double el?:-), and what did I find, but a thread title asking for the correct pronunciation of Dewi!.

Note to self: One must never forget what an incredible archive Mudcat is!

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Mary Humphreys
Date: 22 Jul 06 - 07:06 PM

"Llwybr" is path. "Cyhoeddys" means public. Adjectives mostly go after the noun in Welsh.
Mary

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST, Topsie
Date: 22 Jul 06 - 08:10 PM

Thanks for the correction Mary - and I was feeling SO clever.

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Anne Lister
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 03:54 AM

If any Mudcatters on the other side of the Pond (or elsewhere outside Wales) want to come and visit, can I put in a plug for our new venture, which is a writer's retreat here in Pontypool? Best to check out the embryonic website
for full details ...*s*

Anne

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Anne Lister
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 03:55 AM

Bother ... blue clicky didn't work ... website is http://www.plasawen.com

Anne

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,sian west wales sans cookie for some reason
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 04:29 AM

Llwybr cyhoeddus is pronounced LlOOEE bir cuh HOI this, remembering what we said about "Ll" above. All Welsh words have the accent on the penultimate syllable.

Huw, 'wistle' could be something to do with 'gwestu' meaning 'to lodge' or 'gwystl', 'to pledge'.

Jeff, I believe Blodau'r Grug is out of print, although I think you can still find it in music shops where the stock doesn't move quickly. There's a follow on volume, Cadw Twmpath, which is still available but the standard sessions tunes are mostly in Blodau'r Grug. There are a few others around too. Sian James has just brought out a new 'folk' album but I haven't heard it yet. Of course, she is one of many and there are CDs available for every taste, cerdd dant to cajun, vocal, instrumental, archival to experimental. There are links to a lot of today's groups at www.trac-cymru.org.

sian

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 05:35 AM

Is Gogs still going, jeff? I know Paul who was the last of the original owners packed in but I don't know if anyone else took over.

The "session/open mic" you mention is actually the Conwy Folk Club and (as far I know - I don't live in the area now) they have Guest nights as well as singers nights. The sessions happen before the start and during the break - started by accident really - most of us who started it also played in a session in Llandudno.

I'm not a bluegrass lover but I used to go to Trefriw during the Bluegrass Festival weekend. I thought that made a much better venue for the event than Bodlondeb, Conwy.

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Alba
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 07:31 AM

Here's a link for Tabster/Anne's website: Writer's retreat in Pontypool

Looks wonderful.
Good luck with new venture Tabster:)
Jude

Subject: RE: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Anne Lister
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 12:33 PM

Thanks, Jude ... all we need now are the writers!

Anne

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST
Date: 23 Jul 06 - 10:52 PM

I take it that English is a second language in Wales?

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 03:18 AM

I thought Welsh was a second language in Wales.
A couple of generations ago Welsh was beaten out of school pupils, now in some schools the teaching is in Welsh.
But that's hearsay, someone will give the whole story.

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Anne Lister
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 03:41 AM

It depends entirely on where you are in Wales. In some areas, Welsh is the first language, while in others it's English. Signs throughout Wales are bilingual, as are official documents, messages on ATMs and lots more. There are Welsh language channels on tv and radio. For an increasing number of jobs it's important to have a good knowledge of both languages. Here in south east Wales all schools are encouraged to use Welsh for a lot of instructional language (sit down, line up, stop talking, doing the register, sorting out school lunches, asking permission for leaving the class etc) as well as teaching the language formally, and there are an increasing number of Welsh medium schools (my nephew and niece attend one of these) which are an attractive proposition to parents as standards of achievement and behaviour are high.

Yes, in the past there were attempts to suppress the language and children speaking Welsh in class were punished, but there's been a huge resurgence of interest and pride in the language since the 1960s and the language is strong and healthy.

Anne in Pontypool

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh st
From: sian, west wales
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 04:35 AM

Well answered, Anne.

Just thought I should add a bit for Huw re: gwystl - it can also mean 'hostage', that is, a person who is left as a pledge for some future act. You could build up an interesting story for the place based on that!

sian

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh st
From: Paul Burke
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 05:00 AM

A few points- Derbyshire was scarecely deserted in Roman times, though probably quite thinly populated. As I said before, it's not a residence of choice, at least in the days before easy transport and consequent appreciation of wild beauty.

The (lost but existence certain) lead mining centre of Lutudarum was somewhere around the south Peak district. There were potteries near Duffield, forts with their vici (shops, businesses, wives and floozies) at Chesterfield, Derby, Brough (Navio- the river is still the Noe) and Glossop (Ardotalia, romantically also called Melandra) and also probably at Buxton and Carsington. there was quite a network of roads, the ones that are marked on maps only a sample. There was a Romano- British settlement at Roystone Grange, and one is believed to have existed at Bonsall, but that was unexcavated when it was (illegally) quarried away a few years ago.

"Twistle", not "wistle"- it's a Norse word for the land in a fork in a river or stream.

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh st
From: sian, west wales
Date: 24 Jul 06 - 06:32 AM

Ah. That's one word sorted then.

sian

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh st
From: Mary Humphreys
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 03:29 AM

Further to Tabster's posting above: My Nain ( Grandmother) who was born and bred in Aberffraw , Anglesey told me that she was beaten by her schoolteachers if she spoke Welsh anywhere in school - even in the playground. As a monolingual Welsh speaker you can imagine the hard time she had of it. Most of the other village children would have been in the same position.
I cannot imagine the reason for such cruelty, yet I believe that something similar happened in Brittany many years back in order to suppress the Breton language.
When I first moved to England from Wales in the 1960s I was mocked by my ( mainly Home Counties ) English colleagues for having a Welsh accent. I spent a couple of years determinedly losing it to get those vicious people from off my back. I wonder if things like this still go on?
Although I don't now have the accent I still sing in Welsh just to show what wonderful traditional music there is ( and was ) in my home country.

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh st
From: GUEST,Jon
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 05:05 AM

A friend of my father once told me a punishement in his area (he now lives in Deganwy but I've a feeling he was born and brought up on Anglesey) was being made to wear a placard.

I do have my reservations about the moves towards Welsh speaking jobs. Even the post my mother had (she was a senior physiotherapist and had worked for 20 odd years without speaking Welsh and without problem) became Welsh speaking ESSENTIAL on retirement and that's just one...

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: HuwG
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 05:51 AM

Re: GUEST, Brian Peters's post:

... and and what a session it was (The Globe, 24/07/06). Attended to the point of bursting, some remarkable music.

(If anyone wonders who or where I was, I was the one in the ridiculously loud shirt, playing first in the fireplace, and subsequently next to the doorway to the gents' lavatory. As I said, the session was well attended.)

I could only exchange a few words with Joel, but he liked the "international" numbers i.e. the Grateful Dead's "Friend of the Devil".

I'll have a word with the management, see if I can bagsy a bigger playing area for the sessions. After all, the jazz acts (sometimes only 3 players) on Sunday afternoons can take over the entire lounge; why can't twenty session players ?

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: Anne Lister
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 06:40 AM

As to Mary's post - I think children have an unfailing knack of spotting anything that marks out difference, which can be anything from hair colour and accent to levels of achievement. I had the opposite experience to Mary. We moved to Wales in the early 1960s and I was picked on unmercifully for being English and having an English accent as well as for being clever (I had passed my 11 plus exam early and was therefore at grammar school at the age of 10). I can vividly remember the unpleasantness of it all - it's not all one sided, and never was!
As to the language issue - there are many countries in the world who have attempted to stop a language in its tracks. France with both Breton and Occitan, Spain with Catalan, England with Welsh, Irish, Cornish and Scots Gaelic are the first ones that come to my mind, but I'm sure there are others. There's an element always involved in suppressing revolutionaries and insurgents, but also an element within the population of self interest in learning the language that will give an economic advantage (which is why I assume India has retained English as an official language). Many members of my extended family, who are Welsh, have a healthy scorn for the Welsh language and a total ignorance of their own culture.

Anne

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Brian Peters
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 09:20 AM

>> A friend of my father once told me a punishement in his area (he now lives in Deganwy but I've a feeling he was born and brought up on Anglesey) was being made to wear a placard. <<

The same thing happened in the industrial South. My Dad told me that during his schooldays in Merthyr Tydfil the punishment for linguistic incorrectness was to be made to wear a wooden board, hung around the neck on a string, which stated "I spoke Welsh today" (intended as an admission of shame rather than a boast). I daresay they were beaten as well.

Exchanging messages about sessions in Glossop is slightly off-thread(although the initial posting did prompt discussion of the Peak District), but yes, Huw, it was a rip-roarng session and Jody Kruskal (New York concertinist, for those who haven't met him) was particularly impressed that he could join in Grateful Dead songs at a traditional music session in an English pub!

Incidentally "The Management" at the Globe, Diana, used to attend the folk club in the Crown twenty years ago. She's on our side.

Next time I'll say hello to the man in the loud shirt.

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh st
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 10:55 AM

Funnily enough I drove past the Globe today - It was advertising an 'Irish' accoustic music session. Is this the same one and the description is not very accurate or is it on a different night?

Bringing the topic back to things Welsh I noticed the moors were well ablaze. Not the Welsh nationalists setting fire to cottages again? ;-)

Cheers

DtG

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: GUEST,Brian Peters
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 11:05 AM

My understanding is that the repertoire varies from more Irish to less so, depending on which musicians are there (although Huw would know more). But, although part of me resents English and all kinds of other music being lumped together under the description "Irish", I can't really blame the pub for putting up a notice that will at least give the average punter a vague notion of what to expect. If they wrote "English music session", no-one apart from the folkies would have any idea at all.

The moors are officially closed because of the fires. But too hot to go walking anyway.

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh st
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 11:23 AM

Ahhhh - Good point about the description. We often get it at our open session during the festival. When someone has played a good Morris tune or sung an English ballad you often hear "I love all that Irish music..." I have given up correcting them:-)

I remember being turned away from Grinsbrook on the way up Kinder once because the moors were on fire. We had to spend the afternoon in the Nags head. What a shame...

:D (tG)

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh stuff
From: mindblaster
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 11:45 AM

Welsh is a drink!

Subject: RE: folklore: Welsh pronunciation & other Welsh st
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 25 Jul 06 - 11:48 AM

100!