Black Rooster Kapelye Goes to Wales

It is not every day that music from the Baltic borderlands finds its way into the green folds of mid-Wales. But this May, that is exactly what is happening — and we could not be more delighted to share it with you.

Black Rooster Kapelye is heading west for two special events: first a concert and workshops at The Lost Arc in Rhayader on 27 May, then onward to Fire in the Mountain — a small, beloved folk festival on an ancient farm nestled between the Cambrian Mountains and the coast of Cardigan Bay, where red kites turn overhead and someone is always, somewhere, playing something.

Fire in the Mountain was born in 2009 out of friendship and stubbornness, and it has stayed that way: not-for-profit, small by design, run on principles of community and transparency. Wood-fired pizza, a cold river plunge pool, campfire sessions that go long into the night. The kind of place where music is not entertainment but atmosphere — it is simply in the air.

Arriving here with songs from the Baltic forests and the Jewish towns of Eastern Europe feels like a homecoming to somewhere we have never been before. The Cambrian hills are not the Latvian countryside. The sheep are not the same sheep. But the impulse behind the music is the same: people finding beauty in a hard world and deciding to pass it on.

Details and tickets: thelostarc.co.uk and fireinthemountain.co.uk