Y Bardd Glas Geraint is a deconstruction/reconstruction of the tone poem "The Bard" composed by Jean Sibelius. Whilst the original is a beautiful piece of music in its own right, I decided to remake it in the mental image I had after researching the origin of the folk tale that Sibelius had based his music upon.
Being of Welsh origin, I was surprised and delighted to find a Welsh origin to "The Bard", based on the story of Glasgerion (English) or Glas Geraint (Welsh). The story tells of a harpist and King's son named Glas Geraint who plays his harp before the daughter of another King. She is so impressed she invites him to meet her later, and he returns home to sleep, asking his servant to wake him before the meeting. The servant then dresses up in fine clothes disguised as Glas Geraint, rides to meet the Princess and brutally rapes her. The tale ends, unsurprisingly with the death of all three.
I wanted to create a dark swirling vortex of sound which for me reflected the tragedy of lost love, broken trust, violence and death.http://www.archive.org/download/AlanMorseDavies-YBarddGlasGeraint/AlanMorseDavies-YBarddGlasGeraint_vbr_mp3.zip
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