The annual Gregynog Festival will take place in a couple of weeks with a range of events at Gregynog Hall, Tregynon and other venues in the area.
The season celebrates the vision of the Davies family – Gwendoline and Margaret Davies and their brother David, 1st Baron Davies - for a better world rooted in culture and peace following the First World War.
Highlights at Gregynog include the Odysseus Piano Trio (Friday, 28 June, 7.30pm) and A Nocte Temporis, directed by Reinoud Van Mechelen (Saturday, 29 June, 7.30pm).
"Odysseus are playing music by Beethoven and Schubert that is perfectly suited to the acoustic of the historic Music Room, while A Nocte Temporis, the rising stars of the early music world, are making their Wales début appearance with a beautiful programme of Bach arias for tenor, flute, viola da gamba and harpsichord," said Dr Rhian Davies, the festival's artistic director.
"The Davies family’s interests in peace are explored in an afternoon of talks at Gregynog by Dr Jan Ruzicka (Saturday, 29 June, 2.30pm) and Craig Owen (Saturday, 29 June, 4.00pm).
"Jan is the Director of the David Davies Memorial Institute at the Department of International Politics, Aberystwyth University, while Craig is the Head of Wales for Peace at the Temple of Peace and Health in Cardiff.
"Pontcadfan in Llangadfan has quickly established itself a popular Festival venue and this year’s concert will be given by the chamber-folk band VRȉ, followed by a delicious afternoon tea at Cwpan Pinc that is included in the ticket price (Sunday, 23 June, 2.30pm)."
VRȉ are Patrick Rimes, Jordan Price Williams and Aneirin Jones and their début CD Ty Ein Tadau has just won Album of the Year at the Wales Folk Awards.
For Gregynog Festival, they showcase the album in the context of two remarkable 19th-century portraits interpreted by Peter Lord, the leading historian of Welsh art.
VRi will also be playing some new tunes drawn from the collection of Dr Meredydd Evans (Meréd) and Phyllis Kinney at the National Library of Wales.
Tickets are available now from gregynogfestival.org and 01686 207100.
