Imagine in one evening seeing: Andy Narell on steel pan improvising with the Caribbean jazz of the group Sakesho; Son de Madera pouring out a furious torrent of jorocha music from Veracruz, the most African city in Mexico; Congolese troubadour Lokua Kanza, backed by his brother and daughter, introducing in English his powerful philosophical laments about universal themes; Quetzal from L.A. with the female lead singer stamping out rhythms on a 2x2 wooden box and belting out gusty soul music; the veteran doo wop group The Persuasions harmonizing beautifully; Latin Grammy-nominated flamenco guitarist Juan Carmona and his nine piece Sinfonica Flamenca tearing through their set to a rousing applause. And this all in one evening! The format: 20 minute showcase sets. Bang bang bang--one almost immediately after the other. The producer for is particular evening at APAP was San Francisco-based agency Eye for Talent and they certainly lived up to their name. 

The 47th annual Association of Performing Arts Presenters (APAP) conference in New York with over 3,500 participants tempted by over 1,200 artists showcases has just wrapped up its five day run. Exhausting but inspiring! I'm pleased to report that world music occupies an ever more well-received and substantial place at APAP's table of artists, talent agencies, and arts presenters, including heavy-hitters such as the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts in Philadelphia and the Walker Arts Center in Minneapolis. (See feature on afropop.org homepage of Banning Eyre's vivid pictures and reports on globalFEST, APAP's world music showcase of 13 classy world artists on three stages on three floors at the Public Theater).

By many accounts, a large percentage of world, jazz, and classical concert bookings in the U.S. come out of APAP. Presenters are moved and deals are done. Like the annual WOMEX world music trade fair in Europe, if an artist delivers an exceptionally strong performance, they stand a much better chance of earning prized bookings throughout Europe and the U.S. That means that what went down at APAP this January translates into what world music and other music fans will see in 2005, 2006 and beyond. As someone said in an overheard conversation in an elevator at the New York Hilton, "This is where artists try to sell themselves to arts buyers."

Parallel to the music showcase marathon at APAP are the daytime panel discussions that can be very stimulating (or can be same old, same old). APAP for a second year in a row dedicated a full day of panels to world music that were well attended. Many familiar faces from the worlds of concert presenting, talent agencies, the media, and record labels were in the room but so were professionals brand new to world music. On the whole, the world music panels at this year's APAP refrained from indulging in bitching and moaning sessions that can happen at some industry conferences. Instead, they focused on analysis of real problems and positive success stories and ideas for solutions to the persistent challenges.

And, thankfully, we for the most part studiously contentious issues that are open-ended and unresolvable as in why-call-it- "world music?" You just have to look at the folkies that have been arguing about "what is folk music?" for over 50 years and see that such taxonomy/marketing questions are largely a waste of precious time and energy. For better or worse, "world music" is our marker for our place at the table for the time being--on air, in print, in concert programs, on record labels, in retail, on tv, and on-line. The imperative as I see it is to maximize that benefit from the world music buzz and be creative in transcending the ghetto effect. (But before leaving this "big question", I'll just say that I was troubled to hear world music described by the pros in the room as "a genre." World music of course not one genre. A marketing strategy for placement, yes, but not a "genre." The term denotes a wide and diverse sonic and cultural landscape of many genres and many traditions and many ingenious ways of combining pop and roots sensibilities.)

I was asked to moderate a panel called "The Ecology of World Music: Diverse Perspectives on World Music in North America."

We tried to make this session as interactive as possible, as advertised, leaving half the session for comments and questions. A show of hands at the top of the hour revealed that most of the people in the room were concert presenters. Of those folks, more than half presented 50% or more world artists in their seasons. Others in the audience were artists, artist managers, booking agents, journalists, and record label chiefs. So, in flesh and blood, we truly saw the living human network that makes up the ecology of world music.

In my role as moderator who sets the overall context, I spoke about reminding ourselves of the needs of the key stakeholders--the artists, the audience, and the presenters/mediators. For the artists, I said the needs as I see it are first of all to do their work and to find an audience. And of course they need to make a living. In the case of Afropop stars, they often talk about the pride of representing what is good about Africa and their countries to an American audience saturated with bad news from the continent.

The audience needs I think are: to see a quality program; experience beauty and some kind of transcendence; learn about the context of unfamiliar cultures; feel like they got a fair deal for the time and money spent.

The presenters need to stage quality events and bring in an audience, feel fulfilled by the audience response, cover their costs or at least make ends meet with combination of earned income from ticket sales, corporate sponsorships, individual donations and foundation grants. (Many audience members don't fully realize how hard it is to stitch together the funding to offer them concerts. If they did, they might be more motivated to become a member of the presenting organization or to buy the artists CDs and t-shirts which venues get a share of).

Let me hasten to add what I overlooked at the panel discussion about this four legged chair, namely, the funders. The modern Medici. What do they need? Recognition of course. For foundations, they seek to fulfill their mission by supporting organzations that match their goals. For sponsors, they  want to make positive impressions with audiences they value. For individuals, they need to feel sympatico with their donees. And they all need to be thanked. Sounds obvious, right? But it's often not done well.

Within this deep ecology of what makes world music a living organism, the larger forces at play are demographics, the state of the economy, and the fluctuating security/immigration limitations. As everyone knows, the U.S. is becoming more and more a nation of many colors, ethnicities and religions. We are all living in an age of fundamental shifts in the ongoing grand American experiment. All of us motivated by the inherent idealism of world music know the stakes are high.

In my opinion, in order to move the world music field forward, we have to remember to thank more often the sponsors and arts patrons who make our work possible. Not just at year-end contribution time when we ask them to write another check but throughout the year. And we need to be more proactive in inviting to the table what should be natural allies for world music .e. the humanitarian/good works/human rights community (witness inviting the Red Cross and Save the Children to have a presence at globalFEST); visual arts and international film fans; the fashion world; the development community whose main goals are economic development, capacity building and poverty alleviation in developing countries.

Music is a big player in the "creative industries". Performing arts presented internationaly that also counteracts bad PR and stimulates conscientious cultural tourism that fuels jobs for workers and entrepreneurs in the performing arts, crafts, hotel, restaurant, transport, venue, guided tours industries.

And how about connecting more creatively with associations of people who love common past-times i.e. cooking and world cuisine. And let's not forget parties! Please--more pre-concert cocktail parties and post-concert receptions for the artists. We are a community after all, NOT aliented urban individuals and couples with little interest in socializing.

<<I hereby offer the services of myself (aka deejay Prince Segue Segue) and the charismatic Afropop Worldwide host Georges Collinet to your venue or town for one of our high energy Afropop Dance Parties. Best to collaborate with your local public radio station. We can now combine a dance party with a screening of our warmly received first film "The Festival in the Desert: The Tent Sessions" (This is NOT the French film "Festival in the Desert" sold commercially as a DVD.) If interested in an Afropop Dance Party, film screening, and/or music set performed by New York based guitar maestro from northern Mali, Abdoulaye Alhassane and author/guitarist/Afropop.org editor Banning Eyre, email us at b2b@afropop.org).>>

Martin Perna, baritone sax player and one of the co-founders of groovin' Brooklyn based Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra, gave the panel audience an artist perspective. He critiqued presenters for pricing tickets too high and thus cutting out a younger audience. Martin also revealed that everyone in Antibalas, and this is one of the most successful world music bands touring the U.S. and Europe, all live under the poverty line! To the point band members feel they have to decide whether to continue as professional musicians or to have children! Yikes.

Bill Martinez, a San Franciso based immigration lawyer with a long-term commitment to helping Cuban artists get visas to perform in U.S. and to help Americans professionally engaged in culture and journalism get U.S. permission to visit Cuba, spoke about what he saw as "a thirst for political engagement" among music fans in the U.S.

Rosi Amador of the Roots Agency that books artists talked about the importance of getting access to ethnic communities such as the Peruvian community for the Peru Negro tour she booked.

Harold Hagopian of the record label Traditional Crossroads and a talent agent, spoke the term "world music" as too vague. Better distinctions have to be made for talent buyers i.e. it's a classical or folk art form. Then appropriate venues can be selected. Harold told of a presenter when presented with a Korean act saying "Oh we did Chinese last year" as if everything in the "Far East" was more or less the same. 

Massoud Saidpour, the Director of Arts at the Cleveland Museum of Art talked about the psychology of art. He reminded everyone that presenters ARE audience. And that when a performance gives you a shifting point of perception i.e. joy, spiritual insight, transcendence, that's a good instinct to go on for your audience. He also advised presenters to mix the familiar with the unfamiliar. All new all the time may be too much to absorb.

A few quick notes of comments from audience members: klezmer artist Frank London spoke of the importance of a narrative. Key to the Klezmatics success was having a narrative that would excite presenters and journalists.

Robert Singer of the French Music Office spoke of the often neglected power of language (and meaning) to engage an audience.

Bill Bragin of Joe's Pub spoke of how contextualization such as showing a film before the concert like they did with their sold-out two day, four concert run with Tinariwen helped give audience much fuller appreciation for the Tuareg culture and the Tuaregs' tumultuous guerilla war history in Mali in the 1990s.

Marco Werman, producer and presenter of the PRI/BBC weekday newsmagazine "The World" moderated an inspiring panel discussion in one of APAP's Burning Issues sessions called ""It's All World Music: Building Bridges and Taking Risks." On the panel were: Philip Bither, curator of Performing Arts at the Walker Arts Center; Mervon Mehta, president of programming and education at the Kimmel Center for Performing Arts; the Malian artist Rokia Traore; and Esther Won, project director for the Silk Road Project. More on highlights from this panel in next week's installment of our APAP report.

The main impression about the state of world music that I walked about from the APAP marathon was energy. Beaucoup energy! Starting of course with the talent and passion of the artists presented. But it also seems there's a renewed buzz among arts presenters. Our field enjoys growing interest and support. On the pragmatic side, it's a challenge. Few presenters are making money. The music businss is a tougher story. Overall, with CD sales declining some 5% each year and the legit digital download economy still modest, it's tough to make a go of it for world music labels. The Bush administration's policy for granting artists visas (with especially extreme limitations when it comes to some countries such as Cuba) makes for nail-biting, hair-pulling uncertainties for presenters. But the commitment is there. Enough professionals seem willing to deal with the financial and visa-clearance challenges.

For so many reasons--the outstanding, audience-pleasing talent first and foremost, the importance now more than ever of connecting Americans to the rest of the world, the need for presenters to grow with the times and in fact to sometimes take risks to help their audiences grow--world music is more and more becoming part of Americans' experience and consciousness.

Special thanks to the leadership of APAP--Sandra Gibson and Kim Chan--for their progressive work in exposing world music to the arts presenting community. Thanks also to APAP members Bill Bragin of Joe's Pub, Maure Aronson of World Music/CRASHarts; and Isabel Soffer of World Music Institute for advocating for world music and for making it real with the smashing success of globalFEST. Special thanks for Isabel for putting together the world music panels at APAP. And to all the panelists for their participation. And thanks to all the unnamed individuals and organizations in the trenches moving the movement forward. Bravo! Onwards!