2009 FESTIVAL SEASON NOT OVER YET

Coachella and Lollapalooza may take the limelight, but world music has some good festivals, too, and a couple of the best are yet to come. The Chicago World Music Festival features such notables as Blick Bassy, Hanggai, Los de Abajo, Cheb i Sabbah, and Markus James, as well as such up-and-comers as Watcha’ Clan, Fishtank Ensemble, Kusun Ensemble, and Momo. The festival will take place from September 18-24 in various locations around the city. Find more at www.worldmusicfestivalchicago.org.

Not to be outdone, !Globalquerque!, the Albuquerque world music festival, will take place Sept. 25-26 on three stages at the Hispanic Cultural Center. As of press time the scheduled bands include those same Blick Bassy from Cameroon and Kusun Ensemble from Ghana, as well as Novalima from Peru and Vasen from Sweden, and many others from the ethnic nooks and crannies of the US and world, including and especially New Mexico’s own Robert Mirabal of Taos Pueblo, Dine’/Kiowa Toppah & Yazzie, and Dwayne Ortega and the Young Guns. This is a pretty impressive lineup for a city that ranks only 59^th among the nation’s largest metropolitan areas. Always looking for new angles to get the music to the people, organizer Tom Frouge has even added a pre-show !Localquerque! in conjunction with the NM State Fair on Sept. 20. These are top-notch world music gatherings that would usually only happen in a major city with major funding, so good work, guys! Find details at www.globalquerque.com.

Back in LA, the Levitt Pavilion at MacArthur Park wraps things up this week with its traditional 1-2-3 punch of Korean Music-Central American Independence Day-Mexican Independence Day Celebrations on Sept. 11-12-13 respectively, ending another great season of free music for all us folks, down in LA’s inner city barrio area. Find out more at www.levittpavilionlosangeles.org. Since Levitt Pasadena and Grand Performances downtown have already finished their summer music schedules, that’ll pretty much wrap things up for LA this summer as things begin to move inside for the winter in what is arguably America’s most ethnic city. Those who knock LA as being celluloidal and characterless haven’t been to the barrio, or Little Ethiopia, or Little Armenia, or Koreatown or Japantown or Chinatown or Thai Town, all with their own celebrations and cultures and languages and immigrants, sometimes still more attached to the homeland than to America. This is notable, and perhaps even preferable, to the traditional ‘melting pot’ concept.

Are you interested in something a bit different? A celebration of Thai culture called Himmapan 2^nd World just may be coming to a venue near you. Created and organized by Todd ‘Tongdee’ Lavelle and supported by the Thai Foreign Ministry and Singha Beer, the shows feature twenty Thai and Thailand-based world music artists, and will appear in at least ten US cities this September, comprising the Northeast, Chicago, Pacific Northwest, California, and Texas. And if you’re thinking of some predictable ballet folklorico, well think again. Thailand has contemporary culture with the best of them, and many different regions and traditions all part of the mix. Long-haired pony-tailed Fulbright Scholar Todd is himself something of a local legend in Thailand, one of the few Westerners to fully break through the cultural barriers and become integrated into the highest levels of Thai society, giving speeches and hosting TV programs, even becoming a self-styled ‘cultural ambassador.’ He’s also a musician and promoter, organizing the annual ‘Rhythm of the Earth Fest’ in Bangkok every year, among others. It should be a good show; there should be more. Find details at http://himmapanworld.com/. Enjoy.