Taff Rapids have been riding the transatlantic wave even before releasing their debut album Blŵgras in March last year. Fiddle player David Grubb made time between band practice and a haircut to chat to Emma Way about their own roots, bluegrass brunches, and crowdsurfing.
How did you get into bluegrass music?
Darren [Eedens, banjo] and I have been playing together in a couple of different outfits for a few years. Darren’s from Toronto and he used to go to these bluegrass brunches on Sundays – three hours of bluegrass whilst you had your breakfast. He’s always loved that genre, and wanted to do something a bit more traditional in Cardiff since moving here. We met up with Siôn [Russell Jones, guitar], so it was just the three of us originally, and we started our own weekly brunch.
Did an interest in the style come from Darren or were you already interested before?
We were all into it in various ways – wanting to do more of it brought the band together. Darren was probably most involved in that kind of music, being a banjo player. I’m from Scotland originally, so Scottish trad and bluegrass came together for me through Celtic Connections and the Transatlantic Sessions. Siôn was already gigging some bluegrass songs in his sets that he’d learned through flatpicking. Clem [Saynor], our bassist, joined further down the line, but he comes from a jazz background.
And since then you’ve been invited to various global showcases for the style.
The first one we did was the IBMA World Of Bluegrass 2023, in Tennessee, which was a shock, really – we just threw our name in the hat, not really expecting to get anything back. Then we played Folk Alliance International 2025 in Canada, and felt a lot more comfortable there: it was a wider variety and we’d honed our style by that point. When we went to the IBMA, we hadn’t quite gotten there yet.
Where does the Welsh-language aspect tie in?
The first thing we did was the song Honco Monco, which we brought into our weekly brunch. I brought in a fiddle tune, then Siôn asked if he could put lyrics to it. He opted for Welsh lyrics, nothing too tricky, so we could begin that journey of learning Welsh – the rest of us had varying levels [of proficiency] in the language. When we did the IBMA, we ended up bringing the song Dacw Nghariad to the set and put a bluegrass fiddle tune alongside it. Things just blossomed from there. People really latched on to it, in Wales and internationally. In the States, people really loved it.
Apparently there was some crowdsurfing in Lorien at one of your shows!
Yeah, at Festival Interceltique last year! There’s always a theme, and last year’s was ‘cousins of America’ – our music is the merging of American culture and Celtic culture, so was perfect for that. We ended up doing a late-night show to 5,000 people, so everyone was quite merry by this point. The crowd surfing was certainly a first for us, and people were singing along to the lyrics in English and Welsh! It was amazing, but very different.
That sounds like an amazing moment for you and must have made the show.
We’ve had a few really good shows last summer. Green Man Festival was an afternoon gig on the Chai Wallahs stage at 1pm, but it was packed and people were up for it. We’ve had a good year, so long may that continue. We’re just going to ride that wave at the moment.
Taff Rapids play the Lyceum Folk Club, Newport on Thurs 26 Feb and tour the UK and then Europe throughout March, April and May.
Info: taffrapids.com
words EMMA WAY
