Wales has a rich musical heritage, and although many of its traditional instruments are not commonly heard, there are still musicians keeping the folk traditional alive, arranging and performing melodies that have been popular for centuries. Celebrating its musical roots helps confirm Wales distinctive culture. As we enjoy the tunes, dances and instrumental forms that have delighted us for generations, we can become part of the tradition as it moves forward.

Wales has an unbroken tradition of harp playing. It was used as a dance instrument and for playing tunes and airs. The tradition owes its survival to the gypsy families of Wales who kept harp playing alive, and Nansi Richards, the famous harpist Telynores Maldwyn. In Wales the triple harp was popular, an instrument with three rows of strings as opposed to the conventional harp which has one row. It has been the tradition in Wales to play the harp on the left shoulder with the right hand playing the lower strings and the left playing the higher ones. This style of playing is possibly unique to Wales. The growth in popularity of the singly strung classical harp at the beginning of the 20th century had a negative impact on the popularity of the triple harp, with the result that today there are few triple harp players in Wales.

One of the oldest of traditional Welsh instruments. The crwth is a form of stringed lyre which uses a bow to play the strings. There is archaeological evidence to suggest that similar instruments were in use 5,000 years ago in ancient Mesopotamia and Egypt. The range of notes is limited, with a range of just a single octave, and all the strings are played at the same time. The sound created has a droning quality, which can be strange to the unfamiliar ear. There are a number of crwth players in Wales, including Cas Meurig, who continues to develop the crwth repertoire, and Robert Evans, who with vocalist Mary-Anne Roberts, recreates 'cerdd dafod', literally 'dance of the tongue'. Cerdd dafod was a form of singing with crwth accompaniment, which flourished in Wales from the beginning of the 14th century to the end of the 16th century.

The pibgorn is a simple reed instrument once popular with shepherds and cattle drovers. It is made up of a wooden pipe and the horns of a bull. One horn is used as a mouthpiece and another to form a bell end which helps amplify the sound. The pibgorn consists of six holes for the fingers and a thumb hole at the back, similar to a recorder, giving a range of 8 notes. It was used for playing dance music and passing the time on the cattle droves. Pibgorns are rare instruments, although they can be made to order by specialist instrument makers. The musician Stephen Rees, who plays with the folk group Crasdant, continues his work in bringing the pibgorn sound to new audiences.

The penny whistle or tin whistle has been a popular instrument with players through out the world owing to its low cost, ready availability and ease of construction. The oldest whistle found in Wales is believed to be 900 years old and was found at Chirk castle. It appears to have been made from the bone of an animal. Other historical evidence of its use in Wales includes the Nant Garw sunday school annual tea parties which took place during the 19th century when it was used to accompany the dancing when no harp was available. "And when you heard the tin whistle, the children ran to watch them practicing the dancing" - Margretta Thomas, 1880-1772 A close relation of the whistle is the flute. Until the late 1800s most flutes were made out of wood, although most are now made from metal. It was usually played with other instruments such as the harp and fiddle. The black wooden flutes we see traditional players using today were once orchestral instruments that were discarded when the modern metal version came into use.

Wales' other unbroken tradition, apart from harp playing, is its step or clog dancing. The dance was originally performed by farmers and slate quarry workers and often came in the form of a competition where dancers would show off their stamina and athleticism. The difference between Welsh clogging and other step dance traditions is that the performance will not only include complicated stepping, but also 'tricks'. For example, snuffing out a candle flame with the dancer's feet, 'toby stepping' - similar to Cossack dancing - and high leaps into the air.

Wales has a long tradition of fiddle playing and its music was popular with the great Romany familes of Wales. Three people who were renowned for playing both harp and fiddles were Cornelius, David and Adolphus Wood. Unlike the harp there is no unbroken tradition of fiddle playing in Wales, but because the players wrote down their tunes the repertoire has been preserved. We don't know how the fiddle actually sounded so have no idea of styles. Many manuscripts from 18th and 19th centuries contain tunes which appear very similar in style to contemporary classical or popular music.