www.gwales.com - 9781906998066, Songbird is Singing, The

ISBN: 9781906998066 (190699806X)Publication Date November 2009
Publisher: Parthian Books, CardiganFormat: Paperback, 218x138 mm, 282 pages Language: English Available Our Price: £9.99

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Gwales Description

♥ English Book of the Month: December 2009

It's the 1920s. Airships, prohibition, Al Capone, talkies, gramophones, the Empire State building: the world across the pond is bursting with excitement and the future wide open for two small boys at home on their north Wales farm.

Hunangofiant dyn sydd â'i wreiddiau yn yr 1920au. Ceir yma sôn am awyrlongau, gwaharddiadau, Al Capone, y 'talkies', gramoffonau, Adeilad yr Empire State; roedd bywyd yn yr Unol Daleithiau yn llawn cynnwrf a gobaith i ddau fachgen bach ar fferm yng ngogledd Cymru.

Gwales Review

It's hard to imagine, in today's world of reality TV and instant communication, that there would be much resonance with Alun Trevor's moving childhood reminiscences of his father's singing tour of America in the 1930s. Today the story would no doubt be very different. Trevor's father, the famous tenor Jäbez Trevor, would be plucked from obscurity by Simon Cowell, embark on a whirlwind tour of the United States as part of a supporting act for Susan Boyle, and keep in touch with his family at home via the wonders of video conferencing (or even fly them all out to see him for a quick photoshoot).

However it's the stark differences with modern life and ideas of fame that make this story so compelling. The wonders of ‘a cable under the sea’ that allow telegrams and even telephone calls is miraculous to a boy missing his father. The joy of catching sight of the Royal Mail motorcycle with the promise of a postcard with a foreign stamp, or gathering around the only ‘newfangled’ wireless in the village to listen to a live concert, create a sense of intimacy, shrinking a huge world and bringing it home long before the internet invited us to move into the global village.

Eighty years on, Alun Trevor looks back to a quieter time, one of austerity and very simple pleasures. He remembers a dear brother who only wanted to sing and own a leather football; a life on a steep hillside smallholding filled with books and dreams of far flung place like ‘Chicawgo’; and a mother who rushed to get the washing off the line if a plane flew over, embarrassed by the thought of it being seen. This is a poignant and evocative memoir that would appeal to anyone with an appetite for nostalgia, perhaps as an antidote to today’s fast-paced world.

Michael Nobbs

It is possible to use this review for promotional purposes, but the following acknowledgment should be included: A review from www.gwales.com, with the permission of the Welsh Books Council.

Gellir defnyddio'r adolygiad hwn at bwrpas hybu, ond gofynnir i chi gynnwys y gydnabyddiaeth ganlynol: Adolygiad oddi ar www.gwales.com, trwy ganiatâd Cyngor Llyfrau Cymru.

The following has been provided by the Publisher:

Author Biography:

Alun Trevor had a Welsh country up-bringing during the 1920s in Treuddyn, a coal-mining and farming village south of Mold, Flintshire. He was educated at the Coed Talon Elementary school and at the Alun Grammar School in Mold. After matriculation he began work with the Flintshire Education Department in 1938.

He volunteered for the RAF in 1940 and began five and half years of military service. Initially based at Jesus College Cambridge within the RAF education core he was posted to Shaibah in what is now Iraq. His service in the Middle East included spells in Baghdad and Tehran. He also used his leave to tour the Holy Land. He completed his RAF service with Bomber Command’s Pathfinder force and also completed his teacher training.

After World War II he developed a career in education including employment with Flintshire Schools before moving to Kent where he met his wife Mary Addison. They married in 1952. At this time he also took part in an international exchange with Island Trees High School, Levittown on Long Island in the United States. He traveled widely in the Eastern United States and addressed the Utica New York Eisteddfod. On returning to the UK he moved to Malvern while continuing to study. He completed a BSc in Economics with the University of London which enabled him to broaden his teaching to economic history in secondary education.

Since retiring in 1980 his main interests have been with the Clwyd Family History Society and the Chester Welsh Society. His bilingual publication Cofio Cantorion The Welsh Imperial Singers the story of their tour of Britain and North America was published in 1991 at the time of the Mold National Eisteddfod. He has written widely on historical matters for a magazines and journals including Y Faner and Ninnau.

His father, Jabez Trevor, was a miner who became a professional singer with the Welsh Imperial Singers.

Further Information:

Eagerly they follow the progress of their father, famous Welsh tenor Jabez Trevor, as he tours North America season after season, the Welsh Imperial Singers packing concert halls coast to coast and their dad sending home postcards, letters and presents from Chicago, Winnipeg, New York.

Despite talk of bulls, bears and stock-market crashes, the Depression meant little to young brothers Alun and Arthur as they carved their initials into the sycamore tree below Hope Mountain; read Mark Twain and longed to see the great ships that would bring their father home.

Eight-year-old Arthur hated to read and write, sang like a songbird and wished only for a real leather case football like Dixie Dean. The future was wide open, but tragically for Arthur it never came any closer than the makeshift football pitch on the flat field at Pen-y-Wern farm.

Now, eighty years on, his brother Alun recalls those early days with a joyful immediacy in this haunting, music-filled memoir of a time long gone, but still glowing with life.

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