We performed at the St David’s Welsh Festival over the weekend of 6fed & 7fed of March (see the Oriel for some pictures). This is now the 3rd time in as many years that we have sung at this festival.
We left Swansea on Thursday 4fed and travelled through the day, arriving in Paris where we were picked up and taken to our hotel in Disney Village. We had 34 choristers along with Rhian and Nick. We were aware that we would not be singing outdoors as construction work was being carried out at Sleeping Beauty’s Castle. However, this was a blessing in disguise as it was bitterly cold throughout the weekend, despite the sunny skies!
On Friday we were taken to the Fantasyland Festival Stage to carry out sound checks and also meet with a number of officials of Disneyland and the Urdd Welsh Youth Movement. A new partnership is being developed between the Urdd and Disneyland following “Mickey’s” appearance at their Eisteddfod in Cardiff last year. The theatre was wonderfully decorated with a large Welsh flag behind the boys on the stage and large numbers of daffodils and leeks displayed around the hall. After the sound checks we spent some free time in the Park before having a quiet night in preparation for our heavy workload during the weekend.
We were taken to the stage for the concerts on the Saturday where we started by recording ‘Cwm Rhondda’ for television, which was to be shown later in the week on ‘Wedi 7’, on S4C. We then performed 4 concerts and were joined in the first 3 by some of the Urdd National Eisteddfod winners from last year. This was a new initiative and proved a huge success. The theatre was packed on each occasion with around 250 people, and the first concert finished with our National Anthem, which received a huge ovation and set the tone for the weekend. All the soloists were absolutely brilliant and it was a joy to perform with them. Our last performance finished at around 4.30pm, and we went into the Park again before meeting for our evening meal and a quiet night in the hotel bar.
We were up early again on Sunday morning and taken to the theatre for another 4 concerts during the day. Again we were pleased with the attendances and it was clear that the organisers had taken heed of our suggestions from previous years and much more advertising was in evidence. We ended the day with a lovely meal in our hotel and, once again, enjoyed a great ‘afterglow’ in the bar until the early hours of Monday morning!!
This was another fabulous trip for the choir and the organisation by our secretary, Alan Clewett and the officials at Disneyland was perfection. Special thanks must go to Freddie and Nora, who looked after us so well during the weekend and to Sue who was in charge overall. Also thanks to Nick, Rhian and Steve for all their hard work in preparing the choir for this weekend.
