The 2023 Festival started on 26th April with the play “Murdered to Death”, performed by the Radyr Drama Society at Morganstown Village Hall. The audiences were good on both Wednesday and Thursday, but Friday was a sellout. Everybody agreed it was an excellent performance. This was the first time the Drama Group had been part of the Festival, and hopefully the Drama Group will stay as part of the Festival in future years.
Saturday dawned bright and sunny and at 9.30am the RMA volunteers all appeared to set up the Fete. This was the first time the Fete was to be held in Radyr Primary School a much larger venue than the traditional OCR and this allowed us to have a lot more stalls as well as the usual BBQ and bar. The choirs and orchestras of both primary schools performed and there was also maypole dancing. Children had a chance to try out some circus skills and had an opportunity to make bird boxes themselves and to take them home. Residents enjoyed it so much that the BBQ ran out of food and the bar had to be restocked. There were still people around when the event finished, much later than in previous years.
Saturday evening saw our first concert, organized by Cardiff West Rotary. Castell Coch Choral Society performed a wide variety of music which was much enjoyed by the audience. Much like the play, audience numbers were almost back to pre-Covid levels.
On Sunday about fifty people met at Radyr Station for the History Society Walk, led by Allan Cook. The walk looked at the industrial past of the area and lasted for about two hours. It went North up the river towards Morganstown and returned along the Glamorganshire canal looking at the various feeders and ended at the Melingriffiths water pump.
Sunday evening saw our Civic Service at Christ Church. This was attended by The Lord and Lady Mayoress of Cardiff, Mark Drakeford MS, the First Minister and a local Member of the Senedd, Kevin Brennan the Member of Parliament for Cardiff West, County Councillors, Community Councillors and many residents.
Wednesday say the Noson Gymraeg with Radyr’s Merched y Wawr hosting at the New School Rooms learning about Hanes yn y Tir.
Thursday saw the annual Festival Quiz where nine teams competed strongly to show who was the “Smarties”-est. With jokers spread across the rounds and the lead changing throughout the evening each of the teams showed their strengths across the eight varied rounds.
Friday was the first of our lunchtime concerts and was a harpsichord recital by Despina Homatidou. She included works from around the Mediterranean, Portugal, Spain, Italy and her native Greece.
Friday evening we had an excellent new event with the Pint of Science Night held at the Golf Club. We had researchers in the fields of Dementia, Parkinson’s Disease and Cardiac disease from Cardiff University and the Royal Glamorgan Hospital, who spoke about their work in language everyone could understand. There were lots of questions from the audience who were keen to see this event continue in future with different topics.
Sunday dawned bright if not quite sunny, putting to rest the fears we had of having to cancel the event earlier in the week. A lot of volunteers turned up at Radyr Primary School, a new venue for the event, to help us set up. Over the afternoon the audience increased in size to our normal 4-500 and the bar and BBQ were selling non stop, especially the bar after the sun came fully out. The bands were excellent as usual and a fabulous day was had by all.
Unfortunately Bank Holiday Monday started wet but as many people as normal came out for the Open Garden event. There were 4 gardens open and a plant stall and tea/coffee available in the OCR. The weather brightened up which helped to swell the numbers. People were seen walking all around Radyr & Morganstown with plants sticking out of bags.
Tuesday 9th saw a new event at the OCR. Tom Pinder of the Welsh Cheese Company based in Taffs Well, introduced us to a selection of some of the more interesting cheeses made in Wales. These were accompanied by wines and prosecco from our bar and everyone had a fabulous evening with many people asking us to have a repeat event next year.
Thursday was film night with a showing of the classic “The Great Escape”
Friday lunchtime saw our second concert at the Methodist Church. Weiying Sim (soprano), Andre Soares, (baritone) accompanied by Jane Samuel (piano) put on a fabulous performance from a wide variety of composers. It was nice to see so many people at a lunchtime concert again.
Unfortunately, the Jazz evening had to be cancelled due to an incident in the OCR making it unavailable to use.
Saturday dawned bright and sunny whilst we set up Lychgate Gardens for the dog/tractor show. The ice cream van and coffee stall both came as well as a number of others including the owls. The BBQ was busy all afternoon and just about sold out.
We were very lucky with the weather this year as all three major outdoor events, the Fete, The Coronation Party in the Park and finally the dog/tractor show all took place in good weather.
On Friday 7 July 2023 the Festival Committee held their “Wind Down” event to thank the team of volunteers who make the Festival happen. At this event a cheque for £7,500 was presented to the British Heart Foundation Cymru for monies raised during the May Festival. More money has already been raised by the RMA and other groups across the community and BHF will remain the RMA’s charity for the rest of 2023 which will cover all of the community Christmas events.
Radyr & Morganstown Festival 2023
