Festivals Receive KBA
This year, The Blues Foundation awarded the Keeping the Blues Alive (KBA) Award to two international festivals that are exceptional in supporting the blues. From Columbia to Poland, the blues is thriving worldwide – thanks, in part, to the efforts and passion of the Cali Blues & Folk Festival and the Jimiway Blues Festival.
Colombian musician Carlos Reyes (rt) leads a blues masterclass at the Cali Blues & Folk Festival. Photo courtesy of the Cali Blues & Folk Festival
Cali Blues & Folk Festival A Stepping Stone for Cultural Exchange Cali, Colombia
Cali, Colombia, traditionally known as the world capital of salsa, carries a historical musical tradition with deep African roots, easily found in the city’s food, diverse community and openness to visitors. It was only natural that it become home to one of the most important blues festivals in Latin America. Each September, the Cali Blues & Folk Festival takes hold of Cali and up to nine other cities in Colombia with a week-long celebration of concerts and educational activities that promote blues music, its history and its culture as a genre that is very much alive outside the United States. Festival programming showcases live performances and educational events (conferences, masterclasses and workshops) with musicians, artists and scholars from the U.S., Colombia and around the world. The festival also offers diverse thematically curated content such as library events and film screenings, reaching an increasingly diverse audience. The Cali Blues & Folk Festival is a multi-venue, nonprofit event organized by the Centro Cultural Colombo Americano, a binational organization whose mission focuses on creating transformative experiences for the community through teaching
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Blues Festival Guide 2020
English and promoting cultural dialogue with the United States. With this mission in mind, the Cali Blues & Folk Festival serves as a platform for exceptionally talented artists from Colombia and the U.S. to showcase their distinctive styles of music. The festival’s multi-city tour has made it possible for Colombian, as well as international, performers to build new audiences around the country. Keeping true to this purpose, the Festival helped create the Colombian Blues Society in 2013, an organization recognized by The Blues Foundation, and which promotes the Colombian blues music scene. For over a decade, the festival has been an important platform for artists to reach audiences throughout Colombia, enabling exposure to each city’s different characteristics and traditional music. Each city within the tour becomes a stage for experimentation, exchange of knowledge and transformation for the participant artists and audiences. The Cali Blues & Folk Festival has been strengthened through networking with local, national, international, public and private cultural and educational institutions. Festival partners and sponsors have included the U.S. Embassy in Colombia, Colombian Ministry of Culture, the national network of binational centers, local governments, universities and cultural centers. The Cali Blues & Folk Festival was honored with the 2020 Keeping the Blues Alive Award, becoming the first Latin American organization to receive the award. The organization’s Cultural Director, Michael Cadena, accepted the award at the ceremony in Memphis, TN. This year the Cali Blues & Folk Festival will take place September 21-30, 2020. For more information, please visit www.colomboamericano.edu.co/programa-especial/bluesand-folk-festival
Jimiway Blues Festival Spreading Love for the Blues Ostrów Wielkopolski, Poland
Out of passion for the blues, the Jimiway Blues Festival in Ostrów Wielkopolski, Poland, was founded in 1994 by father and son team, Benedykt Kunicki and Oskar Kunicki. Named in tribute to legendary guitarist Jimi Hendrix, it has become tradition to open the festival with Hendrix’s anthem “Who Knows,” getting the crowd excited for the two-day event held each October. The festival, which is attended by 1,400 fans each year and often
