New Gypsy CD, Mabinogion DVD and video, aerial photographs

What's "The Mabinogion"?

What have you been missing ... before The Lord of the Rings there was THE MABINOGION. Widely recognized as the finest arc of Celtic mythology, the eleven stories were preserved in two Welsh collections, The White Book of Rhydderch (c.1300-1325) and The Red Book of Hergest (1375-1425), though the stories themselves hail from an oral tradition dating back to the tenth century. At its core are tales of heroes and men, birth and death, gods and beasts, penance and vindication, kinship and kingship, battles and quests. THE MABINOGION embraces much of ancient and early British culture, combining the numinous world of Celtic mythology, Arthurian legend and feudal Europe’s Age of Chivalry. Indeed, scholars have identified that it was out of THE MABINOGION that the Arthurian legends were born.
Search on the net for The Mabinogion and you'll see how well known it really is!

ValleyStream's Gwilym Davies Aerial Photo Library - a stunning archive of 32,000 aerial photographs of North Wales on medium format. Taken over 25 years by Gwilym, flying out from Mona Airfield with ex-fighter pilot Arfon Evans. A photographic/text database has now been compiled for a quick search, and the Photo Library is now available under licence for commercial and private use. So if you require or would like an aerial photograph of your area, for whatever purpose, get in touch!

Wide range of sizes and prices, prints from negatives or image-ready Jpegs for publication, etc.
Click here for further details.

ValleyStream first worked on tales from the Mabinogion visually in 1995. The Mabinogion is the most famous collection of Welsh tales, dating back to the dawn of the Celtic world. For hundreds of years bards told these stories to spell-bound listeners at the courts of the Welsh princes.

They kept alive the history of their tribes, celebrating heroes such as the Emperor of Rome who married a Celtic princess and the earliest known King Arthur. It wasn't until the 10th century that the tales were written down – and now ValleyStream has produced them on DVD.

Recently, the Mabinogion has inspired the work of many authors and poets, such as JRR Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings.

Six stories are beautifully narrated here by Cybi the Monk, found sleeping with his apple in the heather-clad mountains of Wales. Original colour illustrations melt into stunning motion footage of dreamy wildlife and sleepy Welsh landscapes.

More details and to order a copy

Talking the Songs - Rokkraben o Gillia

Bob Lovell - Romani singer songwriter - sings both traditional Romani songs learnt from his Dadus and original ones he and his Romani prals have written.

Influenced by his Gypsy past and by the likes of Woody Guthrie and Bob Dylan, in the 1980s he began writing songs and playing the guitar. After some years playing folkmusic clubs, in 1992 the hard work finally paid off, and Bob won the prestigious singer/songwriter's award at New Zealand's biggest folkmusic festival in Auckland

The textures of Bob's songs are both raw and stopping place-flavoured, enriched with tonal essences of earthy mesmerising melodies like you'd hear by the camp fire in the "golden days of the vardo" - so dare you venture out on a cold moonlit night with friends, not to poach but armed with disc player, a couple of rabbits, plus red wine - light a woodfire, and savour Bob Lovell's and the kalo chiricklo's Romani music in to the night.

Excellent Romani CD, worth every Bob!