The Gentle Good – Y Bardd Anfarwol

Following a six-week artistic residency at the Theatre of Performing Arts in Chengdu in 2011, Welsh folk singer and guitarist Gareth Bonello returned to the UK to work on this idiosyncratic project: a concept album that tells the story of the Tang Dynasty poet Li Bai, drawing upon both Welsh and Chinese folk traditions. Being sung in Welsh, the record’s content thus sits at a double remove from Anglocentric perspectives; non-Welsh speakers can only guess at the stories being relayed.

Musically, Y Bardd Anfarwol (The Immortal Bard) is nonetheless a rewarding experience: the record’s narratives are augmented by arrangements from the Mavron String Quartet and members of the UK Chinese Ensemble, which mingle flute, strings and traditional Chinese instruments beneath Bonello’s acoustic fingerpicking and warm vocals. The end result is a surprisingly coherent listen: there’s no sense here of traditions being arbitrarily stitched together, but rather an exploration of unexpected connections and overlaps.