Reality TV - or the sort of stuff Simon Cowell churns out - is not something I would normally waste my time watching. In fact, I rarely watch 'Entertainment' on television because news, sport, and documentaries are far more to my liking. That said, however, over the weekend, I was persuaded to watch a segment of something called Britain's Got Talent; and the reason for this is that a Welsh choir was performing.
After the choir had completed their song (an interesting adaption of a Welsh classic called Calon Lan) the usually-smug Mr. Cowell (seen adjusting his shirt to show off his hairy chest at 1.40 on this video) remarked that he was intrigued to have been affected by something for which he hadn't understood a single word. Not surprisingly, this caused some amusement; not least to myself - because (somewhat uncharitably, I confess), it's my impression that many of the choir - called Only Boys Aloud, by the way, didn't understand what they were singing, either.
You see, coming from south Wales - as most of the choir do - English is their normal day-to-day language. However, in response to years of campaigning by activists, Welsh is now being taught throughout the principality and, as a by-product of this, a thriving 'industry' has been created to cash-in on the demand for Welsh-speakers within entertainment and the media.
Sadly, IMHO, too much of the material on the Welsh-language TV channel, S4C, is delivered to a standard which an amateur dramatic society in England might exhibit if attempting to perform a play in French. However, on a more positive note (no pun intended), programmes which are produced in north Wales are presented far more colloquially by the media. So, it's a mystery to me why S4C don't transfer to Bangor. After all - for different reasons, admittedly - the BBC have been able to move from London to Salford.
n.b.
Although born in Liverpool, my Welsh mother took me north Wales during WW2 and, although I didn't get around to learning how to read or write in Welsh, it was actually the first language I spoke.
