Sir Bryn Terfel is, by any measure, one of the great voices Wales has given the world — a bass-baritone whose Wagner and Verdi have filled the Royal Opera House and the Met. Penderyn's tribute bottling in his name was always going to need to carry weight, and this expression does.
Bottled at 46% ABV from a marriage of ex-bourbon and sherry casks, the whisky is presented in a handsome black-and-gold livery befitting its namesake. The Faraday still spirit, fruity and lifted at heart, takes the dual maturation gladly — sweetness from the bourbon, depth from the sherry, neither bullying the other.
The nose opens with honeyed peach, vanilla pod, plump raisin, and a soft lift of orange blossom that catches you a beat in. The palate is full and resonant — dried apricot, soft toffee, sultana, and a polished oak spice that gives the whole thing structure. There is a roundness here, a singing quality, that feels rightly named.
The finish is long and warming, fading on honeyed fruit and a gentle tannin. At around £60 it sits in the celebratory tier of the Penderyn range, and it earns the badge. A dram for an evening when something is being marked — a birthday, a farewell, a recording, a reunion. Fitting, for a whisky named after a man who has spent his life turning ordinary evenings into something more, who can fill a 2,000-seat opera house with a single sustained note and make the rafters listen.
