Music News

WOMADelaide has announced its preview line-up as part of the 50th Anniversary Adelaide Festival program.

Encompassing four nights and three days of music, arts and dance from every corner of the globe,  WOMADelaide will take place in one of the most beautiful outdoor festival sites in Australia - Adelaide’s Botanic Park- located in the heart of Adelaide’s CBD between Friday 5 and Monday 8 March, 2010.

Earlier in the year South Australian Premier and WOMADelaide organisers announced the festival will grow from a three-day to a four-day event to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Adelaide Festival.

In 2010, over 300 remarkable artists from more than 20 countries, from Azerbaijan to the Western Sahara, will transform Adelaide’s heart into a thrilling musical celebration of the arts and cultural diversity.

WOMADelaide features music, arts  and dance presented  across seven open air stages, alongside more than 100 international food, crafts and display stalls, street theatre, performance installations, workshops, visual arts activities and exhibitions, KidZone and more.

WOMADelaide Director Ian Scobie said the excitement surrounding the 50th anniversary of the Adelaide Festival has extended to WOMADelaide 2010.

“Australia is is in store for an unforgettable Adelaide Festival in 2010 and we are immensely proud of WOMADelaide’s significant contribution to the program since 1992.

“In 2010, we are privileged to host one of the world’s most extraordinary musicians in Ravi Shankar performing on stage with his daughter and fellow sitar virtuoso Anoushka Shankar  as part of one of the most exciting, diverse and spectacular line-ups we have presented to date,” Mr Scobie said.

WOMADelaide began in 1992 at the initiative of then Festival Director Rob Brookman as part of the Adelaide Festival of Arts and was an instant  success, creating an affection and resonance that has flourished in Australia ever since.

The first ‘stand alone’ festival was held in 1993, and the biennial WOMADelaide became an eagerly awaited highlight of Adelaide’s cultural calendar, alternating year by year with the Adelaide Festival and Fringe. The WOMAD phenomenon became so successful that, with the support of the Premier of South Australia and the South Australian Tourism Commission, the festival became annual from 2003.

With more artists to be announced in November, the preview line-up for the 2010 festival is:

Ravi Shankar & Anoushka Shankar (India)
Calexico (USA)
Eliades Ochoa (Cuba)
Xavier Rudd (Australia)
Ojos de Brujo (Spain)
Babylon Circus (France)
The Skatalites (Jamaica)
Djan Djan (Mali/India/Australia)
Nortec Collective Presents: Bostich and Fussible (Mexico)
Kamel el Harrachi (Algeria / France)
George Kamikawa and Noriko Tadano (Japan/Australia)
Grrilla Step (Australia/Pacific)
Amal Murkus (Palestine)
Mairtin O’Connor Trio (Ireland)
Kathakali Dance Ensemble (India)
Lepistö & Lehti (Finland)
Mama Kin (Australia)
Ross Daly & Ensemble (Greece)
Mariem Hassan (Western Sahara)
Besh o droM (Hungary)
Dean & Britta (USA)
Gochag Askerov (Azerbaijan)
 
The WOMADelaide full program and line-up will be announced in November .