“Music connects us all. Look how it’s brought us to this one space,” said Zambian rapper Sampa the Great in her headline WOMAD show last night.
“Music is universal and it connects us all,” said the performer, dressed in red motorbike leathers Not a controversial message but it typifies what WOMAD – “the world’s festival”, they call it – is about.
But Sampa was singing to backing tracks, which didn’t engage the audience as much as the live music on show from artists, known and unknown, with countries from Brazil and Senegal to Pakistan and Bhutan represented.
The wildest set came from US-based, punk rebels Gogol Bordello, with front-man Eugene Hütz, raised in Ukraine, charging around the stage, climbing on every possible stage monitor to hurl red wine at the audience and rouse his forces on rock ’n’ roll violin, accordion, electric guitars and bass.
Their backdrop was a raised fist in Ukrainian blue and yellow, with the word ‘Solidaritine’ (an invented word, and the title of their last album in support of Ukraine) written above it.
“Let’s get some f***ing Ukrainian party going,” yelled Hütz. Gogol Bordello were always brilliant at this variety of rock ’n’ roll mayhem, but the war in Ukraine has given them a purpose, and the collective intensity of their thumping rhythms was something that only music can produce.
The spectre of the war in Gaza also loomed large, and the Friday night show from four-piece Palestinian hip-hop group DAM was rammed. The percussive consonants of Arabic are great for rapping and their singer Maysa Daw is a hugely charismatic stage presence.
The hugely enthusiastic audience brought Palestinian flags, placards and the highly-charged feeling of anger and despair.
“Are you ready not to have fun?” quipped DAM’s Tamer Nafer. “Music is our only tool and we’re going to use it. We always used to say we are artists before being Palestinians, but because of what’s happening in Gaza right now, I am a Palestinian before anything.”
Among the many performers appearing in the UK for the first time were Naples folk group Ars Nova Napoli. Their tour de force involved running through south Italian serenades and tammurirata dances with mandolin, accordion and violin, while cooking pasta with potato as delicious wafts of garlic and mozzarella leaked from the pan.
Another highlight was Taiwanese aboriginal singer Sauljaljui of the Paiwan people, who has an electrifying voice and personality to match. In Taiwan, the indigenous people are only 2.4 per cent of the population, but musically their profile feels far higher. Seeing Sauljaljui perform, you understand why.
