After the rousing 10th anniversary celebration last year, Rainforest World Music Festival (RWMF) is now ready to enter into a new decade with a promise of a better festival and more added-value experience for the audience.

The festival, which won the Pacific Asia Travel Associations Gold Award in 2006, will be held from July 11 to 13 at the Sarawak Cultural Village with the picturesque Mount Santubong as the backdrop, a 45-minute drive from the State’s capital, Kuching.

With 15 groups including from overseas performing this year, festival goers can expect a myriad genre of world beat ranging from Celtic fusion, Socca, folk, Baul fusion and traditional. The performers are also from all corners the world like UK; Gambia/Guinea; Philippines; Palestine; Greece; Portugal; Congo; Japan; Columbia; Brazil/USA; India and Angola/Italy/Portugal.  The foreign bands were selected from the more than 450 applications submitted to RMWF organizing committee.

Entertaining during the threes days of the festival will come from Ross Daly Quartet from Greece, Kasai Masai (Congo/UK), Hiroshi Motofuji (Japan), Oikyataan (India), Cholo Valderamma (Colombia), New Rope String Band (UK), Yakande (Gambia/Guinea), Pinikpikan (Philippines), Adel Salameh (Palestine), Beltaine (Poland), Sheldon Blackman and The Love Circle (Trinidad & Tobago) and Fadomorse (Portugal).

There will also be performances from local Malaysian bands. Sarawak will be represented by Kan’id, Orchestra Anak Jati Bisaya, Tuku Kame and SeniDa, the resident performers from Sarawak Cultural Village.  The festival format remained as in previous years- musical workshop in the afternoon and followed by the concert at night.

Ticket is priced at RM90 per day and RM250 for a three-day pass for adult and RM45 per day and RM100 for a three-day pass each for children between three and 12 years old, are available online at www.ticketcharge.com.my.

To add more excitement to the festival, two fringe events have been included to colour the air of festivity to the event which has been enjoying steady growth in popularity. They are Rainforest World Craft Bazaar 2008 (RWCB) and Folk Art Forum (FAF).The RWCB will be held from July 9 to 15 while the FAF is 9 to 10.

Organised by the Sarawak Tourism Board, the festival is one of Malaysia’s best tourism icon and has been listed under the events to be promoted by Tourism Malaysia worldwide.

In its early years, the festival only saw a crowd of few hundreds attending the workshops and concerts. In recent years, the crowd had grew steadily and last year alone more than 22,000 festival goers came for the anniversary celebration. 

This year STB is aiming at attracting a crowd of 25,000 to the festival.

The festival is also supported by the Ministry of Tourism, Malaysia and Ministry of Urban Development and Tourism, Sarawak.

Details and update on RWMF 2008 are available on the festival website at www.rainforestmusic-borneo.com. The website is also enjoying a steady stream of visitors with an average of 6,000 hits daily.

Issued by:
RWMF 2008 Organising Committee
Sarawak Tourism Board
www.sarawaktourism.com
Tel: +6 082 423600 Fax: +6 082 416700