Pontardawe, Swansea and Acoustic Music
Pontardawe - Bridge on the River Tawe
Pontardawe (Welsh for "bridge on the River Tawe") is a town of some 5,000 inhabitants in the Swansea Valley (Welsh: Cwmtawe) in south Wales. The community of Pontardawe, comprising the electoral wards of Pontardawe and Trebanos, is served by an elected Town Council and forms part of the county borough of Neath Port Talbot.
Pontardawe first came into existence as a settlement at the crossroads of two drovers' tracks, one from Swansea to Brecon, and the other from Neath to Llandeilo. Its best known landmark today is the tall spire of St Peter's church which sits on a high point of the valley floor overlooking the Swansea Canal close to the centre of the town.
During the latter part of the nineteenth century and up to the middle of the twentieth century the main industry in Pontardawe was steel and tinplate, with a number of steelworks and tinplate works exporting all over the world. None of the heavy industry remains; on the site of the Alloy works there is now a small industrial estate of a number of small engineering firms, motor maintenance, building supplies and a health centre for the area
Swansea - Mouth of the Tawe
Swansea (pronounced /ˈswɒnzi/ SWONz-ee, Welsh: Abertawe, "mouth of the Tawe") is a coastal city and county in Wales. Swansea is in the historic county boundaries of Glamorgan. Situated on the sandy South West Wales coast, the county area includes the Gower peninsula and the Lliw uplands. Swansea is the second most populous city in Wales after Cardiff and the third most populous county in Wales after Cardiff and Rhondda Cynon Taf. During its 19th century industrial heyday, Swansea was one of the key centres of the world copper industry,[1] earning the nickname 'Copperopolis'.
Archaeological finds are mostly confined to the Gower Peninsula, and include items from the Stone Age, Bronze Age, and Iron Age. The Romans visited the area, as did the Vikings.
Swansea originally developed as a Viking trading post, and the name Swansea is derived from Sveinn's island - the reference to an island may refer to a bank at the mouth of the river Tawe, or perhaps an area of raised ground in marshes. The name is pronounced Swans-y /ˈswɒnzi/), not Swan-sea. The Welsh name first appears in Welsh poems at the beginning of the 13th century, as "Aber Tawy".
The earliest known form of the modern name is Sweynesse, which was used in the first charter granted sometime between 1158-1184 by William de Newburgh, 3rd Earl of Warwick. The charter gave Swansea the status of a borough, granting the townsmen, called burgesses certain rights to develop the area. A second charter was granted in 1215 by King John. In this charter, the name appears as Sweyneshe. The town seal which is believed to date from this period names the town as Sweyse
Acoustic Music
Acoustic music comprises music that solely or primarily uses instruments which produce sound through entirely acoustic means, as opposed to electric or electronic means. The retronym "acoustic music" appeared after the advent of electric instruments, such as the electric guitar, bass guitar, electric organ and synthesizer.
Performers of acoustic music often increase the volume of their output using electronic amplifiers. However, these amplification devices remain separate from the amplified instrument and reproduce its natural sound accurately.
Following the increasing popularity of the television show MTV Unplugged during the 1990s, acoustic (though in most cases still electrically-amplified) performances by musical artists who usually rely on electronic instruments became colloquially referred to as "unplugged" performances.
