Day 11. WOMADelaid ends; Kangaroo Island next

Wow, the WOMAD festival was phenomenal!! I probably shouldn't bore you with the details, but I will anyway:-).

First on tap was Afro Mandinko, from Senegal and Gambia. Good, high energy to get things started!


Then I went to a workshop with Tanya Tagaq, an Intuit (not Eskimo please) from northern Canada. She did some of her throat singing, which was amazing--she sounded like five people at once!--and then she talked about life as an Intuit, which was really interesting. The throat singing is mostly done by the women, as they waited in their igloos waiting for the men to come home from the hunt. The singing tells stories about the animals and about their life.


Then I was walking to the next stage when I encountered the Huri Duna Dancers from Papua New Guinea (a country on my list to see some day. I almost included it in this trip, as it is just off the northern coast of Australia, but too much to see here--next time:-) anyway, this was the first time they had performed outside of their country. Awesome spectacle! Wowee!!





Then it was Rango on the main stage....they were from Cairo. So a little taste of Egypt since I had to cancel that leg of this trip. Again, another time.


Then another place on my list...the Creole Choir of Cuba. (no photo of them).

Then came my favorite, Asa (pronounced ah-sha), from France and Nigeria. She had a phenomenal voice, and the music she had written was "spot on" about the world we live in, both social and political. I liked her enough to wait in line to get her CD. (the shirt is pretty cool, too, huh?, with my signature "globe").


I took a break to eat in the international food bazaar (not your typical festival food) before heading over to see Amadou & Marium, blind singers from Mali (Bonnie, were they at the Mali music festival in january?).


Their back up dancers were quite colorful.




So quite a full day of music and the weather couldn't have been more perfect!

So a nice walk back to my Adelaide home away from home to contemplate my next stop, Kangaroo Island! I'll travel there later today by ferry.

Cheers!

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Location:Adelaide, Australia