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Ballroom vaganza
The Roskilde Festival, this year, will be a true scoop for the worldmusikfans. 
By Mik Aidt
The Roskilde Festival is more than rock, techno, Oasis and Willie Nelson, mud and booze. Actually, this year the organisers of the Roskilde Festival have invited so many non-Western artists and orchestras that the area of world music can be regarded as its own 'festival within the festival'. It will indeed be worth its fare at DKK 860 for the four days that the festival will last. You will experience an impressive number of the leading global exhuberant orchestras within world music. Like last year, the world music concerts will be centered around the 'Roskilde Ballroom'-stage, whereas the most renowned names in world music - such as Femi Kuti and numerable 'surprises' - will perform at the larger stages around the festival square. The Ballroom Stage is placed in a tent in the middle of the so-called 'ethnic area', with stands and restaurants. The Danish based sculptor Ra Kajol from Bangladesh has been appointed to decorate the stages as well as the tents and facades in the area with his colourful art pieces. The organisation Freemuse which is fighting against censorship in the music world will be given a special stand at this years festival, with activities and concerts which are directed towards both the audience and the 5,000 journalists crowded backstage. Mellemfolkelig Samvirke will pop in with a work camp comprising youth from all over the world. A church tent will also be erected where monks and nuns invite the public for spiritual absorption amongst other things. The Cuba fever has also hit the Roskilde Ballroom music booking agent Peter Hvalkof. This year, therefore, he and the festival organisers have made sure to add a couple of the great Cuban top names on the poster, namely Juan de Marcos' Afro Cuban All Stars and Eliades Ochoa, while the popular cinema at the square will show the film 'Buena Vista Social Club'. "Apart from that, though, we will stop short of going over the top. The rest of the Cuban issues are not in the Cuban wave, rather in the cross-over genre which flirts with dance, timba and techno," says Peter Hvalkof. Check out the excerpt from the calendar (below). It speaks for itself. The scene is set for unlimited dancing and partying. 70,000 tickets have been released for sale and are, as usual, expected to be sold out. Info: www.roskilde-festival.dk Tickets (in Denmark): www.billetnet.dk, tel 70 15 65 65 (10 AM - 9 PM)
29. juni - 2. juli * Roskilde Festivalen The official programme is not released yet, but this is what we have been able to snatch up so far: * Juan De Marcos' Afro Cuban All Stars (Cuba), Eliades Ochoa y el Quarteto Patria (Cuba), Femi Kuti & The Positive Force (afrobeat fra Nigeria), Sidestepper (Colombia/UK), Sergent Garcia (salsamuffin fra Frankrig/ Cuba), Sin Palabas (Cuba), Los D'Abajo (Mexico), Funk 'n' Lata (Brasilien), Cascabulho (Brasilien), Ricardo Lem vo & Makina Loca (salsa-zouk fra Congo/USA), Lenine (Brasilien), Wendo Kolosoy (rumbaens grand old master fra Congo), N'der & Le Setsima Group (Senegal), Gnawa Diffusion (hybrid Marokko/ Frankrig), Bo Dollis & The Wild Magnolias (indiansk fra New Orleans), Yat Kha (strubesang fra Tuva), Ferus Mustafov and Band (Makedonien), and many more!
This article is published on print in Djembe Magazine, no. 32, April 2000. Translated to English by Amanda. Feel free to quote or reproduce any article in Djembe under condition of stating source and obtaining permission from author. Photos are strictly copyright of the photographer. Contents of the article are purely the opinion of the author, and do not in any way reflect the official position or thoughts of Djembe on those issues. Consider Djembe an uncensored, open "bulletin board"
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