Culture 10
Medellin utilities giant EPM on November 29 relights 27 million LED bulbs for an annual Christmas-season spectacle in several city parks and neighborhoods, as well as light-show designs alongside Rio Medellin -- absent in recent years due to “Parques del Rio” construction.
The spectacle can be viewed daily from 6:00 p.m. to 12:00 p.m. midnight, November 29 to January 6, 2020, according to EPM. Galleries of photos showing light-show designs from multiple sites are available here: http://fotosgrupoepm.com/thumbnails.php?album=2302 and here: http://fotosgrupoepm.com/thumbnails.php?album=2281 .
Various light shows are installed in Parque Norte, Parques del Río, Avenida La Playa, Carrera 53, the Ayacucho Tram, the Bolívar Promenade, Carrera 70, Las Palmas avenue and more than a dozen outlying neighborhoods and towns.
Towns in Antioquia with EPM-organized light shows include Caracolí, Santo Domingo, Carolina del Príncipe, Dabeiba, Cocorná, Concordia, El Carmen de Atrato (Chocó), Girardota, Ituango, Tarazá, Caucasia, Cáceres, Nechí and Valdivia, according to EPM.
Medellin’s Plaza Mayor convention center today announced that the ninth annual “Expoartesano” show (June 29 through July 8) broke all sales and attendance records, an encouraging signal for growth in demand for native crafts and goods.
During the 10-day event, "Expoartesano" drew 39,879 visitors, who spent a total of COP$4.08 billion (US$1.4 million) at the 430 exhibition stands, featuring 122 native artisans from 21 ethnic groups as well as 68 other traditional Colombian crafts vendors, according to show organizers Artesanias de Colombia.
“Through this type of events, the aim is to turn artisanal activity into a sustainable way of life for the thousands of artisans in Colombia.,” according to the organizer.
“Since its inception, Exporartesano -- in a strategic alliance between Artesanías de Colombia and Plaza Mayor Medellín -- has fostered the circulation and qualification of the national artisan offer, promoting, developing and boosting business, through an event that brings together different expressions every year of the artisan culture and that over the years has become a cultural movement in the capital of Antioquia,” according to the group.
‘Colombia Canta y Encanta’
Meanwhile, the 16th annual “Colombia Canta y Encanta" festival July 12 through 15 will feature 33 traditional song-and-dance artists from Boyacá, Cundinamarca, Nariño, Santander, Tolima, Valle del Cauca and Antioquia, according to show organizers.
“All members of ‘Colombia Canta’ are true stars for their talent, however, some of them have achieved greater recognition for their participation in programs that are broadcast on national television channels,” according to the group, which promotes development of young talent.
Besides live public performances, the festival also will include special workshops for local schools, bringing “recognized masters of Colombian music” as well as a class in orchestra conducting.
Among the participants: 15-year-old Esmeralda Gil Cano, who first gained fame four years ago in the Colombian national TV talent show “La Voz Kids,” and 14-year-old Michael Uribe Alzate, who at seven-years-old made a sensational debut on the “X Factor” TV talent show.
The full program of “Colombia Canta” is available at this web site: www.colombiacanta.org.
American jazz aficionados instinctively know that a satisfying performance of a signature classic – as (for example) by the ever-elegant Ella Fitzgerald – must combine clarity, pitch, purity, control, range, richness, understatement and sincerity.
However: Nobody will ever sing like Ella again (she died in 1996 at age 79). Even some contemporaries -- such as Frank Sinatra -- wisely refused to tread on her American-Songbook-themed albums, as that would be like trampling on orchids.
So, no comparisons possible. Or maybe yes, but in a different way?
Which brings us to Medellin (the ornithological Birdland). But also to Ella Fitzgerald, to the 1940s-1950s Manhattan dreamland, to the Savoy, to Charlie Parker’s Birdland.
Incongruous. Hard to imagine.
Unless you close your eyes, and lend your ears to a troubadour who doesn’t sound anything like Ella, and of course can’t get all the way to her heaven, but still can get you to climb aboard the A Train -- with clarity, pitch, purity, scat, whisper-trailed vibrato, softly suggestive of Brazilian jazz vocalist Gal Costa, and eyes-closed, heaven-seeking sincerity.
Hear those rails-a-thrummin’?
Somewhere over the rainbow, it’s Medellin-born jazz vocalist Claudia Gomez (see: http://www.claudiagomez.com/), a globe-trotting paisa who has performed at some of the world’s top jazz venues (including the Monterey Jazz Festival), composed numerous songs in various genres (inspired by numerous lands), and at long last has found her way – backward and forward in time-- to Ella, and to Medellin.
An attentive, appreciative, Ella-Fitzgerald-loving audience in the times-past paraninfo of Medellin’s Edificio San Ignacio -- in appropriately run-down downtown -- heard Claudia’s time-traveling, dream-inspiring salute to Ella in an October 10 concert, flawlessly accompanied by Medellin jazz pianist Juan David Lopera.
But don’t worry if you missed that show. Gomez will reprise her tribute to Ella Fitzgerald – this time accompanied by Medellin’s Philharmonic Orchestra -- at 5:30 pm Saturday, October 21 at the Uva stage in Medellin’s El Poblado neighborhood. (See: https://www.facebook.com/events/1868732660123131/. For directions to Uva stage, see: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Uva-El-Poblado/936652403150864).
Eyes closed, snapping fingers, Gomez takes a sentimental journey to Harlem, the Savoy, Birdland, lush-life, Ellington, Gershwin, Dizzy, Cole Porter, Rogers & Hart.
Asked about her musical roots and related world travels, Gomez told Medellin Herald: “I lived in San Francisco for 15 years, and while I made my living playing music there, I did not sing jazz, because I was surrounded by the best singers and players in that genre -- and also my compositions were my main work and projection in those years.
"I also sang rock in London in the mid-seventies, and I researched Colombian folk music. So my musical taste is all over the planet.
“I left the Bay Area 19 years ago, went to Spain for four years, and it was there that I timidly started singing jazz, blues.
“I finally am at the point in life where I can sing whatever I like -- and I like a lot of different kinds of music.
“I play guitar and piano. My music heroes are so many! My influences go from Brazilian music, to jazz, to African folkloric music, and all kinds of folk music from Colombia and elsewhere in Latin America.
“My heroes: guitarists Joe Pass, Wes Montgomery, Toninho Horta, Joao Bosco, Guinga. My favorite singers: Ella Fitzgerald, Elis Regina, Leila Pinheiro, Mercedes Sosa, the 'cantaoras' of the coasts of Colombia have been a great inspiration to me also. And composers: Joao Bosco, Brazilians, Marta Valdes, Cubans.”
The just-concluded, 60th annual “Desfile de Silleteros” (flower-carriers’ parade) – the culmination of the 10-days-long “Feria de las Flores” (flower festival) – once again showed-off Medellin’s growing attraction for global tourists and an enticement for foreign investment and relocation.
This year, John Jairo Grajales Gómez of the “El Porvenir” neighborhood in Medellin’s Santa Elena district took the over-all prize for best “sillete” (flower design), as well as best “traditional” sillete.
According to the Medellin mayor’s office, this year’s parade featured 510 “silleteros,” including 23 graying pioneers that launched the event 60 years ago.
Aside from the hundreds of thousands of spectators that lined Avenida Guayabal to witness this year’s parade (crowd estimated at 800,000) -- and thousands more viewing the event on five different television channels around Colombia -- the festival also attracted more than 23,000 non-resident visitors to Medellin, of which more than 10,00 were foreigners, according to the mayor’s office.
Another 50,275 persons visited the “Orquideas, Pajaros y Flores” (orchids, birds and flowers) annual show in the Botanical Garden, according to the mayor. Medellin hotel occupation also rose, to around 65% during the 10-days-long festival.
The mayor’s office cited a study by the “Trivago” internet hotel reservation system indicating that 58.4% of foreign visitors to Medellin during the festival -- as well as the “Colombiamoda” fashion show (immediately preceding the festival) -- came from the USA. Travelers from Mexico, Spain, Peru and Ecuador rounded-out the top-five of foreign visitors.
María Fernanda Galeano, Secretary of Economic Development, added that the event generated more than US$22 million in extra tourist revenues including hotels, taxis, restaurants and services.
Medellin’s Philharmonic Orchestra (“Filarmed”) announced September 22 that it has been nominated for a Latin Grammy award for “Best Tango Album” for its live recorded performance last year of the iconic ballads that made Carlos Gardel the world’s most-famous tango singer.
Medellin’s 20th annual International Jazz Festival launches September 15 featuring top artists including Cuco Valoy, Bobby Valentin, Havana D’Primera and many others.
Even if you missed the 10th annual Medellin Tango Festival in June (see Medellin Herald on June 15, 2016), you don’t have to book air-fare to Buenos Aires to see some outstanding local and international tango musicians and dancers.
Medellin’s 59th annual Desfile de Silleteros (Flower-Carriers Parade) this year is expected to draw more than 800,000 in-person visitors -- plus hundreds of thousands of TV viewers -- for an event that provokes amazement, tears, elation and pride.
The 2016 edition of Medellin’s “Festival Internacional de Tango” steps-out June 17 through June 26 in a spectacle of dance, violins, bandoneones and vocalists.
