Diaspora London Music Village 2008

Taking place from Saturday 12th to Sunday 12th July, from 1-9pm each day, the Diaspora London Music Village is a free open air music festival, set in Hyde Park, London.

The event is the 24th Music Village since 1983 and presents over 80 top-class performers of African, Asian, Middle Eastern, Latin American, Mediterranean and Eastern European origin, all of them drawn from London’s diaspora communities.

Twenty groups of London-based performers are featured in two days of music, dance and spoken word from all over the world. The line-up includes African, Latin, Jewish, Asian, Kurdish, East European and Chinese performance styles, to reflect decades of converging migrations into London from every corner of the earth.

The festival is an eagerly awaited event in London's annual cultural calendar and is organised by arts charity, Cultural Co-operation.

Saturday's line-up is Uyghur Ensemble (China), Guillermo and Rioplatenses (Argentina), Jing Kun Opera (China), Cheb Nacim (Algeria), Jyotsna Srikanth (India), Klezmer Klub (Jewish), Osvaldo Chacun (Cuba), and Africa Jambo (Congo).

Line-up for Sunday is Panache Steelband (Caribbean), PinknRuby (Slovenia), Koma Roji Nwe (Kurdish), Jide Chord and the Natives Abroad (Nigeria), Khantara (Colombia), Gnawa Taroudant (Morocco), Harare (Zimbabwe), and Palenke Band (Latin American).

Festival Director, Prakash Daswani, sets the scene for 2008, "?All the performers in this year's global line-up are London-based, though the origins of most lie way beyond these shores. Some are emerging superstars - or long-hidden gems - within the city's broad sweep of diaspora communities.

"Others have already attained mainstream popular acclaim, both within the capital and far further afield. Together, they represent some of the fruits of ever-increasing cross-cultural mingling in this, the 21st century's leading World City. And what better place for ordinary people to enjoy this profusion of artistic talent than in this year's superb festival setting: a gladed natural amphitheatre nestling by the Serpentine in Hyde Park, central London's most popular green space.

"This year's event presents an easy and direct way for Londoners of all national origins and faith persuasions - or none - and all social backgrounds and ages, to come together and experience this thriving, cosmopolitan, creative and, above all, forward-looking, enterprise, of which they themselves are an indispensable part."

For more information on the festival please visit here.

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