Nefydd

Calan have had a lot of superlatives thrown at them: Cool Cymru, storming juggernaut, Welsh folk supergroup. And ever since they were formed in 2006, when they were still teenagers as young as 13, there’s been an international aspect that laid the seed of their rebranding of Welsh folk music for a wider audience. They met on a folk music retreat in Sweden, and first gained attention at the Festival Interceltique de Lorient in France. The five-piece bring together fiddlers Patrick Rimes and Angharad Sian, Celtic and triple harpist Shelley Musker Turner, vocalist and clog dancer Bethan Rhiannon and guitarist Sam Humphreys. Their focus has always been to find a new take on deep tradition. Their new album Nefydd is also their last. The bittersweet occasion of an album launch plus a farewell tour seems appropriate for an album based on the dark tale of a 12th-century psychopath who drowned his Welsh princeling nephew in a Snowdonian lake.