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Review by Dawn Nugent

If you believe Heaven is in another realm, think again! For lovers of good music, Womad is Heaven on Earth! Most recently gifted to the beautiful location of New Plymouth, Aotearoa.

Review by Dawn Nugent

If you believe Heaven is in another realm, think again! For lovers of good music, Womad is Heaven on Earth! Most recently gifted to the beautiful location of New Plymouth, Aotearoa.

Three days brimming with musical and sensory experiences to blast you into another world, a blissful bubble filled with food, fun, laughter, workshops, aroha, funky people of all ages and a taonga of global musical talent!

Each band we saw blew us away with spectacular mesmerizing energetic performances. Each performance lifting me up into a feeling of joy and peace, transporting me into my souls true bliss, encouraging the body to free its natural rhythm and release its groove thing!

Another amazing thing about Womad is that most bands are on every day of the festival so you get to repeat the pleasure if you really loved a particular band. If you plan it out you can see each band at least once during the festival.

There are also workshops with the performers on dance, instruments and food and if you want to converse with the musicians, ask questions and listen to their stories you can do this with a lot of the musicians at the artists in conversation scheduled gatherings.

Films playing during the festival would also be well worth making time for including

"What About Me?" - 'Grace' and 'Wanting and the Freedom' dirs: Duncan Bridgeman& Jamie Catto, and Mariem Hassan: The Voice of the Sahara would be two I would most like to see. 

Womad felt like one of those amazing nights out at a great gig multiplied by a million with one fantastic performance after another -  a music lovers dream come true!

STAND OUT out performers for me:

Dub Colossus ~ Ethiopia/UK

Nickodemus ~ USA

Ethiopiques ~ Ethiopia/France

Ojos De Brujo ~ Spain

Mariem Hassan ~ Western Sahara

Iva Lankum ~ NZ/Aotearoa

Ross Daly & Ensemble ~ Greece

Nortec Collective ~ Mexico

Kamel El Haraachi ~ Algeria/France

I would suggest that if you are lucky enough to buy any of these talented musicians work you will feel as though you have been blessed with a gift that is truly priceless. (then go and buy another and pass it on to your friends!)

Arohanui Womad!