Worldwide Festival Final Reveal...

with under a month to go now those last minute requests for guest passes are heating up… yes Sete is back on the agenda and the 13th edition about to begin. its crazy how fast the time has gone since my first trip down there - straight from Montreux, where I’d been a guest curator for the previous 10 years… a perfect transition some may say - and a lesson for me in how to programme on a larger scale as opposed to the one off events I’d been presenting in london over the previous years.

I suppose my highlight as a ‘curator’ would have been the Jazz FM, jazz weekend back in the early 90’s… Tribe Called Quest / Pharaoh Sanders / Roy Ayers / Galliano / Brand New Heavies etc… that was heavy and came a few years before Ade Plastic People drew a killer lineup that I was honoured to DJ at that included Theo Parish /Questlove / Pharoah Sanders and Madlib in a warehouse in Shoreditch on New Year’s Eve 2001 (if I remember rightly he lost a packet on that night!)… I remember it well because it was the first New Year since the 9/11 attacks and Theo Parish laid out a heavy heavy set in memory...
I’d also presented the first Jazz Bops at the Town and Country Club in the mid eighties… (Richie Cole was at the first one!)... so for me mixing club culture and live music has always played a big part… the Wag Club on Mondays always had heavy live music (Dianne Reeves and Wayne Shorter both payed there alongside local groups like Tommy Chase, A Man called Adam and Georgie Fame) Dingwalls on sundays was all about the live mixed between DJ sets… Mongo Santamaria, Poncho Sanchez, Dave Pike , Dave Valentin, Jalal… so many… we even had Kid Frost play there one Sunday!

so the excitement I get from putting together a line up is equal to doing a DJ set… its all part of the set up and overall fabric of the night. over the years we’ve had some remarkable line ups when you look back in retrospect… the worldwide awards makes great viewing too, specially when you look back beyond 3 years at least… I remember the one we had at the Garage in Islington - not sure what year - at least 7 years ago… robert glasper / floating points orchestra / el michels affair / lee fields / sbtrkt / sampha / bonobo / andrea triana / darkstar / ghost poet / danay suarez… and thats off the top of my head… not even counting the DJs… mental!
I wish I had kept the flyers for all these… but the moment the night passes I’m on to the next one…
which is Sete….
 

I spend an entire year working on this with Ivan from Freshly Cut… we talk more to each other than our families!
the worldwide festival to me is a combination of all the things I enjoy most in live music and club culture… 
a sort of best of all the festivals that I have experienced…. where African music can sit next to Cumbia and footwork and R+B! and as you can see we have many artists from all corners of the globe... south america is strong this year with Hermeto Pascoal (who everyone must see at least once in their life) from North East Brazil to La Redada (Mexico) and Joana Molina (Argentina)… Ethiopian legend Hailu Mergia joins us for the first time and Seun Kuti finally appears with Fela’s original band Egypt 80…

the british jazz scene is well represented with Joe Armon-Jones bringing his full crew (rare) plus Kokoroko playing on the closing night…. and I haven’t even mentioned BadBadNotGood yet! plus Amp Fiddler, Fourtet Live or the brilliant James Holden with his Animal Spirits… in fact Thursday is pretty massive all round as both Kieren and James will be joined that night by Daphni (finally!!!) and Ben UFO (by public demand!!!)…gonna be Epic
japan day returns on Wednesday with the very first European live from the Toshio Matsuura Project with guest Max and Dan from Soccer 96 and Tom Herbert on bass…whooooosh… and the incredible Akiko Kiyama who will present a show alongside artist Jun Inoue who you may remember from the year he painted with the tap dancing of Kaz Kumagai and Kan Sano on the Piano… Legends of Japanese dance culture DJ Krush and Satoshi Tomiie will make this an unforgettable night I’m sure… wow I’m getting too excited right now… and I’ve not even mentioned Louie Vega, Larry Heard or Moodyman yet…. or DJ Haai or Zinc or Goldie… with whom I’ll do some B2B on a funk and boogie tip… plus the return of Dazzle Drums, Benji B (b2b Lefto) and all day on the beach with Antal…. and the first time for Patrick Forge who I still have the best times with at Dingwalls twice a year…

Mele, Daniel Haaksman, Andres and Jamz Supernova all make their WW debuts and Connie Constance and Crayon make up the emerging live artists… I really wanted to add Yazmin Lacey and Skinny Palembe who were both at the WW awards in Jan but I’ll wait till their albums are out and book them early for 2019!

I sincerely hope you have a great time this year and that we can share many great memories… Worldwide FM will be broadcasting daily from the Town centre with highlights from the previous night and interviews etc… so if you can’t make it in person you can get all FOMO by tuning in there!

finally for anyone wishing to grab late tickets… we only have daily tix left for Sun 1 Mon 2 or thursday 4… get in quick you won’t regret it… and the events on the beach are daily (including our ‘off’ day with Thris Tian's global roots takeover) and both afternoons at Paul Valerie Museum are all free… so even if you don’t have tix for all the nights in the theatre there’s stuff happening every day all the same….

and a massive thank you to all our regular DJs and other’s playing for the first time this year… and to everyone for coming at reduced fees… as you know this is a completely independent festival working closely with the community of Sete in tandem with their other wonderful festivals.
I want to once again thank the town’s folk for their wonderful open hearted and generous vibe.... it wouldn’t be the same without you! 

merci sete… on se voit bientôt!