The South Wales Male Choir Concert

A wonderful variety of music to celebrate St David's Day in the Welsh male choir tradition. Soloists are Welsh National Opera tenor Rhodri Prys Jones and local favourites Helen Page on violin accompanied by Oliver Williams on piano.

Helen began playing the piano and violin at the ages of five and seven respectively and achieved grade eights in both instruments at the age of fifteen. She graduated with a Music degree from King’s College, London. Alongside her academic work at King's, Helen studied Violin with Professor Clarence Myerscough at the Royal Academy of Music. Whilst at university, she was appointed Principal Violinist of the University Symphony Orchestra and had the enormous privilege of attending a violin masterclass given by Sir Yehudi Menuhin. Helen has also been awarded an Associateship of Trinity College, London and has been elected as a Licentiate of the Royal Academy of Music.  In addition, she has been awarded the Performance Diploma in Violin with Distinction by the Associated Board of the Royal Schools of Music. She is the Principal Violinist and founder of The Dell Quartet. In 2008, Helen was selected as one of twelve teachers nationwide, to take part in a project in Southern India working in a charity school for slum children in Bangalore which involved leading workshops and providing resources for teachers, and working with the children to encourage music making in the school. Having been awarded a Postgraduate Certificate in Education from the University of Reading, Helen is now a local violin and piano teacher and enjoys performing regularly.

This is a major charity night by this internationally renowned South Wales Male Choir. Appearing for the second time at St Nicolas Church in Newbury where the invited beneficary distributing the proceeds is the Rotary Club of Newbury. The local charities supported include the West Berkshire Therapy Centre, West Berkshire Mencap and Homeless charities.

About Côr Meibion De Cymru: The South Wales Male Choir

The only Welsh Male Choir to be honoured with the patronage by HRH The Prince of Wales. The choir has performed before HM The Queen and members of the Royal Family, the Dali Lama and Nelson Mandela.

Wales’ only truly regional male choir was formed in 1982 to undertake a tour of the Eastern United States, as a result of Welsh-American promoters witnessing a Royal Albert Hall 1,000 Welsh Male Voice Concert. Performing with leading symphony orchestras under the baton of the BBC’s Alun John and patronage of HRH The Prince of Wales, the 530 choristers from 42 different choirs received rave reviews resulting from 5 sell-out concerts in Pittsburgh, with Baltimore, Washington, New York (where crowds queuing for tickets, at the Cathedral of St John the Divine, stopped the traffic on Broadway!) and finally Buffalo witnessing the Welsh Male Voice tradition at its best.

Success and enjoyment in the 1983 tour had been so great that back home at the ‘winding-up’ meeting, no fewer than 153 choristers (the number present!) unanimously voted to continue; the ‘raison d’être’ being to continue to take abroad the traditions of the Welsh Male Choir. To date, 22 tours have taken place having just returned from Belgium and the German Rhineland – USA (4), Canada (3), France, Gibraltar, Eastern Europe, Australia, together with no fewer than seven Commemorative Tours to the WWI and WWII Battlefields of Flanders and Normandy performing often before Royalty, Government Leaders and most importantly Veterans. The choir has even travelled to Monaco for a one-off concert in the International Sporting Club, and cruised the Baltic with shore based concerts in Russia, Estonia and the Norwegian Fjords. Regular concerts in the UK have been included since the late ‘80s with St David’s Day celebration concerts nearly always being performed outside Wales.