On Bandcamp and CD 19.09.2025: 🜁 🜄 🜃 | Tristan Rhys Williams
These works are conceptually structured around the three realms of Sky, Sea and Land. The collection creates a triskele form of three pieces for each of the three realms.
S K Y
- “…or y kyfarffo y gwynt ac ef, ef ae gwyb“…or y kyfarffo y gwynt ac ef, ef ae gwybyd…”
- “…ef ae gwybyd…or y kyfarffo y gwynt ac ef…”
- “…Math ac Euuyd, hutwyt geluyd ryd eluinor…”yd…”
“Ti a wdost,” heb ynteu, “kynnedyf Math vuab Mathonwy,—ba hustyng bynnac yr y uychanet a uo y rwng dynnyons or y kyfarffo y gwynt ac ef, ef ae gwybyd.”
“Thou knowest,” said he then, “the quality of Math son of Mathonwy ; whatever whisper, however small, that may be between men, if the wind has met it, he will know it.”
[Quote from the Red Book of Hergest (Fourth Branch of the Mabinogi) and the translation by W.J. Gruffydd]
These three works call upon Math’s instruction in alchemically transforming string material and field recordings captured during Storm Darragh (an extratropical cyclone which hit the British Isles in December 2024) into portals of magickal insight. This triptych emulates the divinatory aspect of Math’s capacity to perceive voices on the wind’s wing.
Math fab Mathonwy (ruler of North Wales) represents arch Magus in the most explicitly magickal and ritualistic (Fourth) Branch of The Mabinogi. His spells have the power to shapeshift, transform and teach lessons by turning Gwydion and Gilfaethwy into beasts. Math and Gwydion are also able to conjure a human form from oak blossom, broom flowers, and meadowsweet (naming her Blodeuwedd). Math’s authoritative nature is formidable with his ritual magick seeming to be an intrinsic part of ruling his kingdom. Gwydion and Gilfaethwy are aware of Math’s ability to hear any whispered word should the wind come into contact with it. Math’s power derives from a deep attunement cycle with nature’s elemental forces – harnessing etheric forces for wisdom and knowledge.
W. J. Gruffydd states that Math “belongs to the company of the other-world sorcerers like Llwyd vab Cilcoed in Manawydan, because no word that the wind meets is unknown to him. So also the ‘Coraniaid’ whose “‘knowledge was so great that there was no speaking anywhere on the island, however low it was said, if the wind met it that they did not know,”’ and the Fairies of Snowdon, who were “sharp of hearing, and no word that reached the wind would escape them.’’ [Letter of Sir John Rhys quoted in Wentz, Fairy Faith].
All three pieces function as ceaseless sensory conduits: aiming to propagate the sublime and lingering moment. A vigil of engaging the senses stimulated by the elements – actively listening to the wind and being receptive to its message.
The works utilise nine panels of microtonal harmonic material which form an equivalence of categories. The nine sections (employing a consistent and fixed distribution of forces) divided into triskele form are of approximately equal length framed by an ellipsis.
The first tripartite piece sees the lowest tessitura play most consistently with ‘relief’ material from higher frequencies. Much of the delicately bowed, sustained double-stopped string material takes place on strings II and III with small-scale definition on strings I and IV.
The at once systematised and aleatory process of grafting and distributing the protracted harmonic material in the works aspires to divination through dispersing sustained crystalline pitches on a current of air. The freefall placement of material yields interpretive, omenic insight.
The use of the texts recited in an occulted manner throughout the works is also akin to dispersal whereby seeds are transported by the wind – appearing to float, glide or spin through the air. The manner in which the texts are uttered aims to display a sympathetic attunement with the aether element by distorting and therefore foregrounding the function of breath in speech and oration.
The monochromatic palette of the field recordings coupled with the harmonic treated string material is set into relief by rustling derived from solitary rituals and the Welsh spoken texts.
The first piece includes a spoken extract from the Welsh romance, Peredur, wherein a raven alights on snow to drink blood:
“Peredur stood and compared the blackness of the raven and the whiteness of the snow and the redness of the blood to the hair of the woman he loved best, which was as black as jet, and her skin to the whiteness of the snow, and the redness of the blood in the white snow to the two red spots in the cheeks of the woman he loved best.” (Davies 2007, 79)
This text was chosen for its ability to evoke an astounded moment of almost unbearable intensity which is reinforced by the activated stasis of the field recordings.
The second piece utilises the text quoted above from the Fourth Branch of The Mabinogi about Math’s ability to hear voices carried by the wind as well as extracts of Gwydion’s englynion which function as incantations to sing his nephew, Lleu Llaw Gyffes, back to life from his eagle form of maggots and rotting flesh. The englyn is a traditional and highly complex Welsh short poem form which uses quantitative metres, involving a strict number off syllables, and rigid patterns of rhyme and half rhyme. The englyn form highlights the inherently musical quality of Cymraeg. The restorative power of the englyn has been rendered in a manner that utilises literal reintegration with the tonalities in the field-recorded wind material (imbuing the text with vocoded qualities).
The third and final piece, …Math ac Euuyd, hutwyt geluyd ryd eluinor…, includes the following fragments of Welsh texts pertaining to the air element:
Kanu Ygwynt
Llyfr Taliesin XVII
Kanu Ygwynt. CCC. ATAL.
Dechymic pwy yw.
Creadt kyn dilyw.
Creadur kadarn
Heb gic heb ascwrn.
Heb wytheu heb waet.
Heb pen aheb traet.
Ny bed hyn ny byd ieu.
[Song to the Wind
Book of Taliesin XVII
Guess who it is.
Created before the deluge.
A creature strong,
Without flesh, without bone,
Without veins, without blood,
Without head, and without feet.
It will not be older, it will not be younger]
Marwnat Aeddon
Llyfr Taliesin XLV
…Gwenwyn pyr doeth pedeir pennoeth meinoeth tymhor.
kwyndynt kyfoet ny bu clyt coet gwynt ygohor.
Math ac euuyd. Hutwyt geluyd ryd eluinor.
Y myw gwytyon ac amaethon. at oed kyghor.
Twll tal y rodawc ffyryf ffodiawc. ffyryf diachor…
[The Death-song of Aeddon Mor
The Book of Taliesin XLV
from The Four Ancient Books of Wales
A pure poison came four nightly fine-night seasons.
The contemporaries fell, the woods were no shelter against the wind on the coast.
Math and Euuyd [Eufydd], skilful with the magic wand, freed the elements.
In the life of Gwydion and Amaethon, there was counsel.
Pierced (is) the front of the shield of the strong, fortunate, strong irresistibly.]
Y Gwynt (Dafydd ap Gwilym)
Yr wybrwynt, helynt hylaw,
Agwrdd drwst a gerdda draw,
Gŵr eres wyd garw ei sain,
Drud byd heb droed heb adain.
Uthr yw mor eres y’th roed
O bantri wybr heb untroed,
A buaned y rhedy
Yr awr hon dros y fron fry.
[Sky-wind, unhindered course,
mighty commotion passing yonder,
you are a harsh-sounding minstrel,
world’s fool without foot or wing.
It’s amazing how wondrously you were sent
from the pantry of the sky without any feet,
and how swiftly you run
now across the hilltop on high.]
S E A
4. Duwies Braint
5. Llygad Seiriol
6. Môr Mwrog
Field recordings from Anglesey made using submerged seaphone with underwater incomprehensible utterances. Duwies Braint features recordings of the Afon Braint at Pwllfanogl where she joins the Menai Strait. The Braint on Anglesey is regarded as a goddess cognate and analogous with Brigit. Llygad Seiriol was made at the well dedicated to Saint Seiriol (Ffynnon Seiriol) in Penmon (periwinkles were known as Llygad Seiriol – ‘Seiriol’s eye’). Môr Mwrog was made at the beach nearest Llanfwrog on a stormy day.
L A N D
7. Lôn y Bwbach
8. Dinas Gynfor
9. Llwyfen Cadnant
Further field recordings made using geophone probe inserted into the soil of the sacred isle of Anglesey.
Lôn y Bwbach features field recordings from the Roman Road at Llanddyfnan (Bwbach could translate as ‘spook’ or nefarious fairy).
Dinas Gynfor includes recordings of the reverberations from the Iron Age Promontory Fort on the north coast of Anglesey near Llanlleiana / Llanbadrig. A large site covering twenty-four acres with steep cliffs and a dramatic vista (with Ynys Badrig / Middle Mouse Island in the distance).
Llwyfen Cadnant was made at an elm tree near Dinas Cadnant prehistoric settlement in Menai Bridge.
Tristan Rhys Williams 