Two weeks ago it took place the conference WOMBA. I have spoken about it before, and also about the framework in which this initiative takes place, which is MOST – The Bridge for Balkan Music (you can learn more and read an interview here).

Among the talks and panels there were two that were of particular interest to me. One was the Hidden and Authentic Balkans / Touring panel, moderated by Dejan Vujinović and featuring presentations by Dragi Šestić, Kim Burton and Bojan Đorđević. You have a pretty comprehensive summary of this panel in the latest newsletter of the European Folk Network, which is available here. I strongly encourage you to read it and also to subscribe to that newsletter. You can register, here.

And the other was Ben Mandelson’s opening talk, which had two big themes: the birth and concept of “world music” and the reasons for wanting to export an artistic proposal. I liked his talk very much because I feel that his approach to it was intended to be really useful and he succeeded. He was very direct, he told a lot of things in such a short time and at the same time, it was very easy to follow him, even for not native speakers of English, like me. It is not always easy to understand native speakers of British English. Some don’t realise it, because the rest of us speak their language. But some of us speak what I call “International English” 🤣. I’m sure you get it! It was not the case of Ben, he was understandable. I will summarise him here below.

But before Ben, Ivan Petrovic, President of the Managing Board at EXIT Foundation, made a brief intervention. You should know that this whole WOMBA event was hosted by the EXIT Foundation, associated to the huge EXIT festival. The concerts programmed through MOST took place on a stage within the EXIT festival. Well, it is to be welcomed that this huge festival, which is a wonderfully organized and I was impressed with the immense production and communication work involved in a festival of this size, hosted this stage within the framework of WOMBA.

Well, Petrovic explained that for the last 11 years they had eliminated the world music stage because they had surveyed their audience and their audience didn’t go to the festival because of the world music stage. Well, that’s logical. The audience at that festival is probably going for artists like Nick Cave or Sepultura, who were on this year’s line-up. But whether or not to keep a world music stage at a festival like this, with more than 20 stages, I don’t think it’s a decision to be made like that. If the objectives of the festival are just commercial, it doesn’t make much sense to put resources into a stage for that, but if the objectives are, in addition to the economic sustainability of the festival, to reflect the diversity of the world’s cultures, then it would make sense to have that stage for the minority part of the public that might be interested, and also to create that space and give visibility to the existence of these non-mainstream musics. A foundation has no profit purpose so I understand other objectives must be there, besides satisfying the majority of the public.

In any case, this year there was a stage that was explained as the recovery of the world music stage, the “Pachamama stage”. But it was not very successful in terms of amount of public and I would say also not in terms of programme. And it was super hidden too, so you really had to go on purpose, you wouldn’t find it by chance. But the most worrying issue was that in the same stage there were mixed two tipes of concerts: one, the programme of MOST, with artists from the Balkans, those selected in the project to accompany them in their development and internationalization (the duo of Daniel Lazar (Serbian) and Almir Mešković was my favourite). The other programm was called “conscious music”. Those were very long concerts between the others, which had nothing to do with the artists from MOST. Those “conscious musics” were proposals of a new age concept, so to speak, that could make sense in their own space for chilling out, but not in a supposedly world music stage, generating confusion. Anyway, if this is the idea of recovering the world music scene, it may be better if they did not because it will once again appear to be of no interest to the public and a self-fulfilling prophecy will occur.

In Serbia there are people who are exceptionally capable of developing a proposal under the concept of “world music”. Hopefully at some point they will have more resources to be able to reach a wider audience or they may be included in such a relevant event in a future to give some strengh to the world music stage.

I have said many times before how much I admire this MOST thing and it is really fantastic. It can’t all be perfect and this pachamama thing was not. I don’t know how much involvement had the team of MOST on this strange programme. Surely all involved will assess the rights and wrongs and we will be aware of their new proposals in the future.

Ben Mandelson’s speech

Ben explained about that mythical meeting where this miscellaneous set of music was baptized as “world music”. He explained that in 1987 there was no marketing concept of “world music”. A group of people, mainly from the UK, developed a marketing campaign to identify what was already there. They raised money for an ad campaign and voted for the name. They invested £3,250 in a three-month campaign. They started putting “File under: world music” on the records, so that the shops would know where to put the music and would make a space with that label. All this is no secret. The minutes of the meeting are publicly available, for example, here: Minutes Of Meeting Between The Various ‘World Music’ Record Companies And Interested Parties, Monday 29th June 1987. If you are interested in more details, you can read it. But what I liked most about what Ben said is that world music is a community. That’s all, your Honour.

No, obviusly that’t not all but I agree with all my heart with Ben. World music is what the world music community say it is world music. Bravo.

After this part, Ben talked about exportation of the music. He explained that the music is a symbolic system. Why are you going to export it? Which are your expectations? What are the reasons? He announced 5 elements to be ready to export:

And he added two more: educational will and systemic will.

He elaborated more for each of the reasons, of course, but I was listening instead of taking more notes, sorry! 🤣

OPEN CALLS AND PROFESSIONAL EVENTS

If you have anything to share in this section in a future edition, let me know. 

• The European Folk Network’s annual meeting, open registration. It will take place in Manresa during the Fira Mediterrània. The welcome to the attendants will be on Friday 7th of October and the day of talks and meeting will be on Saturday 8th. After the activities of the network, the attendants will be able to enjoy the showcases of the Fira. Non-members of EFN are very welcome to attend the conference and can register to access airport transfers and lunch, etc., but will pay their own hotel costs. More details and registration, here.

As I am directly involved on this event, as part of the board of the EFN, I can tell you that this is going to be a thilling event, combining a carefully designed program by the EFN with the usual know-how and good taste of the Fira Mediterrània.

👉 Check the Spanish artists I offer from Mapamundi Música, here. They are Vigüela, Entavía, Jako el Muzikante, Xabi Aburruzaga and Citra Trío.