DEVONALD, JOHN (1863 - 1936), musician

Born at Aberdare, 13 May 1863. He belonged to a musical family and possessed a good voice. He was admitted a member of the Aberdare United Choir when he was 11 years of age. In the Cardiff eisteddfod, 1883, he won the prize for singing Handel's 'Is not his word like a fire?' He was elected a member of the United Welsh Choir formed in 1880 to sing Joseph Parry's 'Emanuel' at Cambridge and in London after the composer had taken the degree of Mus.D. In 1885 he was appointed precentor of the Calvinistic Methodist chapel at Abercarn and, in 1887, was appointed to the same position at the Broadmead Welsh chapel, Bristol, where he also conducted the Welsh choir of the town. He won prizes for penillion singing at the national eisteddfodau held in 1895 and 1897, and in the Barry and Port Talbot eisteddfodau was the adjudicator in the competitions for singing to the accompaniment of the harp. In 1890 he returned to Aberdare where, in 1894, he formed the ' Welsh Quartette ' and where, for fifteen years, he conducted the ' Cymric Oriana ' founded by him to encourage the singing of part-songs and madrigals. Between 1930 and 1936 he wrote eighty articles for the Cerddor under the title ' Notes from Merthyr.' He died 25 September 1936 and was buried in Aber-fan cemetery.

Author

• Robert David Griffith, (1877 - 1958)

Sources

• Y Cerddor, 1918 (62), 1936 (256)

Additional Links

• Wikidata: Q20733389

Published date: 1959

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