He was a com­pos­er, adjudicator, conductor, ed­it­or, critic, music historian and entrepreneur. Frequently irascible, especially in his last years which he spent in severe and immobilizing pain, he was one of the foremost figures in Welsh musical life in the period leading up to World War I.

He was self taught, via the most pop­u­lar of all Welsh music pub­lica­tions, John Mills’ Gramadeg Cerddoriaeth, and the two parts of Thomas Williams’s Ceinion Cerddoriaeth (Musical Gems, 1852) with its 200 hymn tunes and seventy anthems and choruses. Later, formal lessons by a music teach­er, Mr. Hughes of Llechryd, a few miles away from his home, gave him a firmer grounding in the old nota­tion used until 1858. The same year, in Bridgend, he sang his first song in pub­lic, conducted his first choir and won his first prize for com­position. In 1863 he moved to Cheltenham, where he worked as a shop assistant and received further lessons in piano and or­gan. He be­came a commercial traveler in 1871 and in this capacity for the next 20 years traveled the length and breadth of Wales, making contacts and observing the growth of music throughout Wales. It was probably during his overnight stays in hotels that most of his musical com­positions were created at the end of his working day. Throughout this period, 66 of his pieces won prizes in competitions in Wales, Eng­land and Amer­i­ca. Evans’s works in­clude:

• Y Caniedydd Cynulleidfaol, 1895 (ed­it­or)

Music

1. Trewen