LATIN AMERICAN ACOUSTIC FOLK QUARTET AT THE RAINFOREST WORLD MUSIC FESTIVAL

Date: 25 April 2006
Written By: Yeoh Jun-Lin

CALLE SUR which means “south street” is made up of 4 musicians with 2 lead vocalists – Karin Stein and Edgar East.

She is white. He is black.

She was a cowgirl who rode horses in the Llanos plains of Colombia. He rode buses.

He watched TV while she grew up with no electricity.

And they are both beautiful to look at and share a great passion for their music.

They will be in Kuching, Sarawak for the 9th Rainforest World Music Festival to play folk music from all over Latin America – the Colombian cumbia, the Dominican merengue, the Jamiacan reggae, the Brazilian samba, and more.

There is so much diversity and colours in South American music – most of it energetic and entertaining.

CALLE SUR will also bring with them 15 different instruments – a lot of them ethnic like the Colombian gaita, the Bolivian charango, the Peruvian cajon, the Cuban tres and the panpipes.

Karin is not a stranger to Borneo. She was here to play for the 2001 Rainforest World Music Festival with a different band – Los Llaneros. She was magnificent in leading several workshops then and she will do the same in this year’s festival.

The festival will run from the 7th to the 9th of July at the Sarawak Cultural Village, just 45 minutes outside of Kuching.

Tickets are available at RM60 per day which will gain access to all daytime workshops as well as the evening shows. Children aged 3 – 12 are eligible for half priced tickets of RM30 a day.

These tickets will be available at all the Visitor Information Centres in Kuching, Miri and Sibu. Or call 082-423600 for more information.

The festival’s website www.rainforestmusic-borneo.com will have information and updates about the festival as well as pictures and materials from previous festivals.

Malaysia Airlines is again the Official Airlines with fROOTS magazine as Media Sponsor. The official telco for the festival is DIGI and supporting sponsors are Heineken and Water Genesis.

The Ministry of Tourism is supporting the event which has been hailed as one of the success stories of the region, while the Sarawak Tourism Board will orchestrate the festival.

This is not the only festival that the Sarawak Tourism Board holds in its hands. 2006 also sees the debut of the Miri International Jazz Festival which will be held in May on the 12th – 13th weekend.

An eclectic mix of bands will be at the Rainforest World Music Festival. The organizers try to get as many and diverse bands in every year. This year will see bands from Mali, Canada, Korea, Austria, Mongolia, France, Kyrgyzstan and more coming in to join Sarawakian and Malaysian bands.

The atmosphere at the festival is casual and informal. In past years, it has become almost like a great meeting place for reunions. The aim is to provide something for everybody and to come up with something unexpected or unknown.

The Rainforest World Music Festival just won the PATA (Pacific Asia Travel Association) 2006 gold award in the Heritage and Culture category. PATA is the leading US based travel industry body.

CALLE SUR will be a band with charisma and class. But then again, we hope that every band at the festival will be like this!

Yeoh Jun-Lin
Artistic Director
Rainforest World Music Festival