National Orchestra of Wales
(Cerddorfa Genedlaethol Cymru)
Conducted by Warwick Braithwaite
Listeners are most familiar with the name of Hughes as the arranger of Irish folk songs, and it is in that direction that he has done very valuable work for his native country. At the early age of fourteen he was organist of St. Peter's Church, Belfast, but a few years later came to London for a thorough course of study at the Royal College of Music. He was one of the enthusiastic spirits who founded the Irish Folk Song Society, and for some time was part editor of its productions. His own actual researches have contributed very largely to our knowledge of Irish folk song, and his volumes of 'Irish Country Songs' and 'Historical Songs and Ballads of Ireland' are fine examples of the way in which such things should be arranged for modern concert use. Besides these and other books of Folk Song, he has given us original music, much of it humorous and even satirical, and he is, of course, well known as a kindly and enlightened critic and writer on musical subjects. He has visited the United States and borne his share in musical criticism there too.
