Idris Higgon was a well-known tenor soloist who was born and raised in Cwmparc. A multi-awarding winning soloist, who also claimed the Blue Riband at the National Eisteddfod of Wales, he regularly shared the stage with the Treorchy Male Choir for over 35 years. Idris and his family were associated with the Treorchy Male Choir during the pre and post-war years as choristers and administrative staff. In fact Idris was more closely associated with the famous Royal Welsh Male Choir, for which he was a tenor soloist for several decades and undertook several successful overseas tours with them. The young tenor first became involved in the Treorchy & District Male Choir in the early 1930s and performed the solo section in one of the Choir’s test pieces at the Royal National Eisteddfod in Port Talbot in 1932 when they competed under the baton of John Isaac Jones.

When Jones’s successor, W.D.Evans took the baton he organised a celebrity concert at Bethania Chapel, Treorchy in February 1934 and Idris joined the line up of talented soloists which included Madame Cassidy Morris, Madame Griffiths, Bryn Jones and elocutionist Tom Thomas. During the following year he joined Emlyn Jones as one of the two soloists to perform Dr Joseph Parry’s “Iesu o Nazareth” for the Choir’s first radio broadcast at the Park and Dare Hall.

When the Treorchy Choir was reformed under John Haydn Davies in 1946, Idris was one of the experienced singers who, despite being a member of the Royal Welsh Male Choir, assisted this young organisation with his singing expertise in the rehearsal room.

In August 1947 the Choir held one of its first concerts since reformation at Salem Chapel in Cwmparc and Idris Higgon was the tenor soloist that evening. He continued to perform regularly with them for the next six years before moving to Ashford in Middlesex, where he remained for the next fifteen years. On his return to the Rhondda in 1968 he resumed his position as tenor soloist and performed his 25th, and last concert as tenor soloist in the Top Rank, Cardiff.