Iris Williams
(1946-2025)

The Welsh singer Iris Williams died in California on 9th July aged 79. Her hit records included He Was Beautiful with music by Stanley Myers and lyrics by Cleo Laine (18 weeks in the charts in 1989) and Perefin Wyf, a Welsh language version of Amazing Grace.

The daughter of an American GI she was born in Pontypridd on 20th April 1946 and raised in a children’s home, before being adopted by a foster family who lived in the village of Tonyrefail. She studied at the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama and as early as 1960 appeared on the BBC Wales pop music programme Disc A Dawn. In 1974 she won the Welsh language talent competition A Song For Wales. My records show that I recorded a session for BBC Radio 2 with her and the Strings of the BBC Radio Orchestra conducted by Neil Richardson on 17th March 1980.

Iris had a brother Ashley but because he lived in the USA the two did not meet until they were grown-up. Ashley described her as “one of Wales’ most underrated singers.” She met and married Clive Pyatt, who became her agent - they had a son, Blake, in 1984. They purchased a pub in Winkfield near Ascot which they re-named The Pheasant Plucker, and she combined this with engagements on the club circuit, also appearing several times in the Royal Variety Performance. In the early 1990s she relocated to New York and appeared in concerts with Bob Hope and Rosemary Clooney, as well as charity events for President Gerald Ford. In 1999 she was invited to take part in a Gala Concert marking the opening of the National Assembly of Wales. Five years later she received an OBE for services to music and two years after that she was admitted to the Gorsedd of Bards at the National Eisteddfod.

Her final professional appearance was at New York’s Birdland Jazz Club in 2016.

© Anthony Wills July 2025