03 October 2013
Three weeks before the WOMEX World Music Festival is set to open in Cardiff S4C can announce that the Channel will be broadcasting the Festival's Opening Concert.
Land of Song, the WOMEX 2013 Opening Concert will be broadcast on S4C on Thursday 24 October.
WOMEX is the main annual event to showcase international music hosted in cities across Europe. This year Wales welcomes the festival for the first time and Cardiff will be centre stage for artists from all over the globe.
Singer Cerys Matthews is the Creative Director of Land of Song, the festival's Opening Concert which is to be held at the Wales Millennium Centre on Wednesday 23 October and broadcast on S4C the following night.
This is the first time that the festival's Opening Concert has ever been broadcast on television. The programme will be produced for S4C by Rondo and Telesgop production companies.
In Land of Song Cerys Matthews will be joined by leading musicians and dancers from Wales to take the audience and viewers on a spectacular, illustrated journey through 30,000 years of the Nation's story, music and culture.
Dafydd Rhys, S4C's Director of Content said:
"It's fantastic that the city of Cardiff has attracted the WOMEX Festival and we're extremely glad to be broadcasting the Festival's Opening Concert on S4C this year. Land of Song promises to be a feast of Welsh music and we're very happy to be making sure that the whole of Wales and beyond can enjoy the evening."
Cerys Matthews, Creative Director of Land of Song said:
“The World Music Expo, WOMEX, (World Music’s equivalent to the Cannes Film Festival) is landing in and bedding down in the stadium-crowned, river-flowing, harmony singing city of Cardiff this year.
"The Wales Millennium Centre declares ‘ In these stones horizons sing! ' and its doors and arms will be thrown wide open to welcome visiting delegates and locals alike in a celebration of song, dance and poetry.
"Together we'll explore 30,000 years of Wales’ story and culture and enjoy the company of today's leading folk musicians, Cass Meurig, Gwenan Gibbard, D n A , Georgia Ruth , Patrick Rimes , Siân James , Robin Huw Bowen, Wales-India collaboration between Gwyneth Glyn and Tauseef Akhtar, ‘Ghazalaw’, Twm Morys and more. Young clog dancers, ' Dawnswyr Bro Taf' will battle out it out with the multi-national dancers of Ballet Cymru over our iconic songs. We'll count goats, celebrate the humble saucepan, ramble over rocks and warm the auditorium ready for the powerful swell of those sweet old Land of Song harmonies, bolstered by the quintessentially Welsh sounds of the Treorchy Male Voice Choir along with the local school choir of Mount Stuart Primary."
As well as the Land of Song Concert a special programme called I'r Byd o Acapela (From Acapela to the World) will also broadcast on the Channel on Tuesday 22 October. I'r Byd o Acapela will feature perfomances from renowned artists including Calan, Ryland Teifi, Ballet Nimba, Seckou Keita and Ghazalaw.
S4C's nightly show Heno will also be getting in on the action as they broadcast live from the capital on Wednesday 24, Thursday 25 and Friday 26 October with highlights from the day's events and a look at the evening ahead.
