Blogs

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Are you a Blondie fan? Do you pine for those glorious days in the late 70's and early 80's when Debbie Harry ruled the airwaves? If so you are in for a treat. Hear Blond-E ( below ) performing 'Sunday Girl' then go to their site HERE for more. You wont be disappointed.
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Blond-E are Diana Watts, Ian Welch, Dom Atreides , Adrian Boyce, Marc Smith and Wayne Trace. AmeriCymru will be featuring an audio interview with the band in the next few days. Keep checking back.

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Our more eagle-eyed members will have noticed that the AmeriCymru Bookstore has undergone a major remodelling over the last few days. The old categories and navigation were somewhat confusing and for various reasons we felt that a reorganisation was in order.

Of course, this means that we will have to re add a great many titles that were formerly listed. Please feel free to suggest titles in comments below. The bookstore is a work in progress and we will be adding a significant number of titles every day over the next week or so.

Additionally we will be featuring a 'Book of the Day' from the store. Todays title is The Day Aberystwyth Stood Still by Malcolm Pryce.

Just had this brought to my attention.

Has anyone read the Thursday Next books by Jasper Fforde? They are a series of tongue-in-cheek detective stories centered around a Literary Detective named Thursday Next (our heroine was born on a Thursday) who works in an fantasy England in which literary crime is rampant and taken very seriously, home cloning makes pets out of Dodo birds, the Crimean War has gone on for a hundred years, and it is possible to enter into the worlds within books of fiction. I just started rereading the first three books in the series, as I wait for the sixth to be published. I really recommend the series. Very funny, fast paced, interesting, quirky characters.

Book one is called "The Eyre Affair" and revolves around attempts, by arch-villain Acheron Hades, to destroy Jane Eyre from the inside as it were as he enters the book to change its plot. Thursday is the SpecOps detective who goes into the book to save it. Thursday's ability to jump into books is coveted by the Goliath Corporation (who owns anything worth owning in the world), and their agent Jack Schitt. Rampant wordplay, and genre-play are displayed as a hire-wire act, with multiple plots and long-running literary jokes cast throughout the series.

Book two is called Lost In A Good Book, and book three is named The Well of Lost Plots. These find Thursday beginning to work for the Bookworld's policing agency Jurisfiction, much as she works for Literary Spec-ops in our world. Jurisfiction maintains the boundaries between genres, prevents "book-jumping" (characters jumping out their own books into others) and monitors the trade in plots and characters.

But I wonder about one thing. The author is England-born, lives and works in Wales, and has a lot of fun with the idea that that the Wales in his books is a Socialist Republic with a closed, militant border with England, and rampant cheese smuggling, a bit gloomy and iron-curtainish. Lenin is referred to as Y Brawd Ulyanov, and the republic was founded by John Frost out of the Chartist Rebellions. Everybody drives Griffin autos. I sometimes find this funny and sometimes find it annoying. I guess Fforde is not a a fan of socialism?

Given the spelling of his name i wouldn't expect him to be English, but the Author writes, "Fforde failed his Welsh Nationality Test by erroneously identifying Gavin Henson as a TV chef, but continues to live and work in his adopted nation despite this setback. He has a Welsh wife, two welsh daughters and a welsh dog, who is mad (but not because he's Welsh). He has a passion for movies, photographs, and aviation."

His website is large, fun, full of in-jokes and expansions on the conceits that drive the books. Find it at www.jasperfforde.com If you like humor in your detective stories, definitely try Jasper Fforde.

Concert Ticket Sales Up nearly 2,000 from last year

Llangollen International Eisteddfod 2012 has been hailed a success despite all the rain that challenged the week events. Over 2,000 competitors from 23 countries overcame the adverse weather to compete in the years festival. Sell out concerts like Alfie Boe on Thursday evening helped to push ticket sales up by 2,000 compared to last year!

At the end of his first Llangollen International Eisteddfod as Music Director, Eilir Owen Griffiths said, It has been a week full of colorful competitions for competitors that have traveled to Llangollen from all over the World. Applicants for the competitions were higher this year which is also reassuring for a Festival in its 66th year. We were pleased that the number of competitors in 2012 remained on par to 2011. The rain did affect footfall on certain days and we had 800 visitors less in comparison to last year, but to counterbalance that, concert tickets Im happy to say were up by 2,000. The variety Llangollen had to offer certainly pulled in the crowds especially the young audience. We are still counting the cost of the extra last minute provisions which had to be provided underfoot due to the bad weather conditions, however we can safely say that Llangollen International Eisteddfod is back on its feet financially and withstood weather condition unlike other festivals.

Terry Waite CBE officially opened the 2012 Llangollen International Musical Eisteddfod in a spectacular all singing and all dancing concert on Tuesday night. In his speech from the pavilion stage he said, The whole of the World has been suffering from economic difficulties, but thanks to the remarkable resilience of volunteers, supporters and sponsors we have yet another successful Eisteddfod in our hands. The festival plays such an important role in the life of the community and indeed in the life of the whole world. It has been of course, a testing year, but it takes more than an economic recession to defeat the spirit of those who stand behind this Eisteddfod.

Soprano Leslie Garrett hosted an all-star lineup of Britains most charismatic artists on Wednesday night and a sellout Alfie Boe concert on Thursday helped to pushed ticket sales to nearly 2,000 higher than last year.

History was made on Friday night when a record number of performers, a 200 strong choir, took to the stage to perform Karl Jenkins The Peacemaker. In complete contrast on the same night at Llangollen Railway Station this unusual location became a second stage for the night and the audience of around 150 were given a feast of folk music by the likes of The Hennesseys and Irish band Ioscaid.

The competitions came to a close on Saturday night with the Pavarotti Trophy awarded to DelicaTon from Germany, crowned Choir of the World.

The Grand Finale Concert on Sunday night bought Llangollen International Eisteddfod to a star-studded close as Walesfinest artists such as Wynne Evans, John Owen Jones and Cr CF1 entertained the audience.

Exiting new changes have been introduced to Llangollen International Eisteddfod 2013. Music Director, Eilir Owen Griffiths added, We want to ensure that Llangollen Eisteddfod has the best choral competitions in the World therefore the International event has begun the search for 40 choirs to compete in the Choir of the World Competition next year and introduced a new Childrens Choir of the World competition. We want to build on this years success and appeal to on even wider range of potential applicants.

The Jenkins Bakery website has been updated with this week's special offers (inc 3 medium corned beef pasties 1.60) - http://jenkinsbakery.co.uk