Festivals Around the World: Couleur Café 2009

If you’re into World Music, one of the best international festivals around is this weekend, June 26th – 28th, the Couleur Café 2009 Festival in Belgium.  Started in 1990, Couleur Café is a dual celebration of the music of the world’s cultures and the start of summer.  Artists representing a range of musical genres, from salsa and flamenco to reggae and R&B, perform.  In years past, Herbie Hancock, The Skatalites, Jimmy Cliff (featured on Jamaica), Erykah Badu, Youssou N’Dour, Alpha Blondy, the late Lucky Dube (featured on Reggae Around The World) and many others have played the festival.  Toumani Diabaté, the acclaimed Malian kora player whose song “Salaman” appears on the Putumayo collection African Dreamland, performed at the 2006 festival. Check out the clip below featuring some of his incredible performance. This year’s line-up features the legendary raï singer Khaled (featured on North African Groove, and Arabic Groove), Ben Harper & Relentless 7, and many others.