Africolor music festival until 20th December

Will Best writing for VINGT paris

Glancing over the welcome page of the Africolor website the festival’s ethic, one of resisting the “current musical trend of cloned entertainment”, becomes more tangible and urgent.  Isn’t it disconcerting, then, that on reflection there always seems to be a set ‘mode’; a ‘scene’; a faceless, consumer driven, image into which innovation must find a snug fit if it doesn’t want to be cast aside? The organizers of Africolor certainly think so and for over 20 years they’ve been taking these identikits, ripping them apart, then fusing them all together again without even looking at the manual.

This isn’t to say that the festival is lacking focus. It's 21st installment will, without doubt, be a carefully sculptured showcase of pure remue-ménage.  Born from the branle-bas of confrontation, from exchange, from consideration of the ‘other’, Africolor wants to take you on a musical journey - one willing to see how many ideas it can incorporate into it's dialogue with Africa.

The range of different media and genre on the program for Africolor’s 26 upcoming concerts is staggering. Alongside traditional Maloya from Réunion or the Trinidadian steel bands, the fact that you’ll be able to sample an African take on everything from contemporary jazz to hip-hop, baroque to improvisation is eye-opening evidence that an important slice of so called ‘western’ music has undeniable ties with a culture it might sometimes view as alien.  Here are a few of our picks to whet your appetite.

Friday, 20 November Rencontre-débat : Qui a dit que l'Afrique n'avait pas d'histoire?

Saturday, 14 November  Kaba-Kô

Monday, 14 December Farenji