OPRA Cymru, the unique Welsh-languge opera company, will be the Artists in Residence at this year’s Criccieth Music Festival which takes place between Saturday, 18 June and Sunday, 26 June.

The festival, which was inaugurated in the 1880s, was revived in the late 1980s, and has been a popular event in Criccieth’s calendar ever since.

Festival organisers have endeavoured to include as many varieties of music as possible over the years, classic and contemporary, as well as including poetry, craft exhibitions, art exhibitions, talks, garden walks and visits, flower festivals, children’s concerts and activities and, always, the David Lloyd George Memorial Lecture and fireworks.

In 2000 there was a world premiere of a specially commissioned Welsh opera, Culhwch ac Olwen by Geraint Lewis and libretto by the late Gwyn Thomas.

“To name headline performers is almost an impossible task as there have been so many great people,” said Jill Glos, festival secretary, “but, just to name a few, there was Bryn Terfel, Catrin Finch, Cleo Lane and John Dankworth, The Temperance Seven, Elinor Bennett, many male voice choirs and Rhys Meirion, who returns again this year to support the launch of OPRA Cymru’s Promising Artists programme with a gala concert on Friday, 24 June in Criccieth Memorial Hall.”

OPRA Cymru will perform at various locations in the town throughout the week, including the Food Slam on the opening Saturday, the Festival Dinner at Bron Eifion Hotel on 21 June and an evening of poetry and song at Dylan’s Restaurant on Wednesday, 22 June, culminating with, as Jill explained, a gala concert at the Memorial Hall on Friday, 24 June featuring the popular tenor Rhys Meirion as their special guest.

For further details and full listings visit the festival website at www.cricciethfestival.co.uk.

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