Welsh Journals

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The remaining chapters deal with the final portion of Clarence Raybould's reign and the work of his chosen successor, Arthur Davison, who served the orchestra from 1966 to 1990. Despite every effort by the authors to enliven the text, these chapters are perhaps the least effective. It is difficult to chronicle the work of an organization when the pattern of activities in each year is very similar to the one which preceded it. The events which stand out are the performance of new works by Welsh composers, the appearances of young, promising soloists, the sudden death of an assistant conductor, Rhoslyn Davies, and a major funding crisis during the Davison era. These chapters justifiably praise the achievements of the orchestra but only hint at a number of underlying problems, too complex to be detailed here. The four appendices are a useful source of information: the first and second of these, which list the names of the members of the orchestra from 1946 to 1990, make fascinating reading, a veritable 'who's who' of Welsh music and musicians of the post-war years. The format of the book is pleasing, the print is comfortable to read, and it is competitively priced. The University of Wales Press are to be congratulated for their continued support of the documentation of the history of music in Wales, of which this well-structured book is the latest example. DAVID EVANS Bangor RUSSIA AND WALES. ESSAYS ON THE HISTORY OF STATE Involvement IN HEALTH CARE. Edited by John H. Cule and John M. Lancaster. Cymdeithas Hanes Meddygaeth Cymru/History of Medicine Society of Wales, Cardiff, 1994. Pp. x, 139. £ 10.00 + £ 1.00 post and packing (UK), £ 2.00 abroad. This slim collection of seven essays is the product of a history of medicine colloquium held at the University of Wales College of Medicine, Cardiff, in September 1991. Three of the papers deal with Russian subjects, two with Welsh, one with health care in the Soviet Union, and one with Russo-Welsh connections in relation to cholera in the nineteenth century. While the geographical range of the contributions is precise, their chronological reach is vast, stretching from the tenth to the late twentieth century. In view of its desktop publishing format and decidedly 'economy' standard of production, this volume has had a long gestation period. Has the wait been worthwhile? As far as the Welsh essays are concerned, it is hard to accept that it has. John Cule's 'The Court Mediciner and Medicine