Monday, August 18, 2008

Petronio Alvarez

Festivo de Musica del Pacifico

Every year the city of Cali hosts an enormous concert festival celebrating the music of the Pacific Coast regions. These areas are primarily inhabited by Afro-Colombians and the influences of their music run anywhere from calypso to African tribal to "polka-ish" to big band to reggae...and everything in between. No matter the sound, though, the talent is enormous! This year the concerts were held in Cali's Plaza del Torro (Bull Ring) and when the crowd got going, jumping around and waving their white hankies, the whole stadium seemed to sway; it was nuts!

The festival runs from Wednesday to Sunday with roughly ten groups performing a night for the first four nights, and the top ten groups returning the last night. My new roommate, Nira, and I went and watched on Friday evening and then again Sunday night with our friend Lisa. Below are some pictures of the night: