MEDIA RELEASE 07 FEBRUARY 2003
ADELAIDE SOUTH AUSTRALIA

He's the don of jazz, ska and rock steady guitar playing. He played a crucial role in the development of artists like Bob Marley and The Wailers, Jimmy Cliff and Johnny Nash, and he's the man whose jazz guitar licks knocked Ronnie Scott's socks off. Now 70, Ernest Ranglin is a living history of Jamaican music, credited as inventing ska and reggae, and next month will make an exclusive Australian appearance at WOMADelaide 2003, March 7 - 9, Botanic Park, Adelaide.

Ernest Ranglin joins the WOMADelaide 2003 line-up of some 350 artists from 31 countries around the world, filling the spot vacated by Cachaito Lopez, who at the last minute was forced to cancel his Australian tour.

The legendary Jamaican guitarist last performed in Australia at WOMADelaide 99 to critical and popular acclaim, and at last year's WOMAD twentieth-anniversary festival in Reading UK, he had the crowd and critics 'skanking happily'...

"There are many so-called 'pioneers of ska' but Jamaican guitarist Ernest Ranglin is the real deal and his trademark plucked skank blew away a huge crowd in the Siam tent", Bristol Evening Post

"... no-one could help but beam from ear to ear after catching Ernest Ranglin's set. A walking, talking repository of Jamaican music, his 70-year-old fingers remain devilishly fast on the fretboard ...",Venue.

Ernest Ranglin (Jamaica)
For more than five decades, Ernest Ranglin has applied his talents to several musical formats, including jazz, big band, ska and reggae. Born in 1932 in Robin's Hall, a village in the heart of Jamaica, Ranglin was playing in Kingston dance bands from the age of 16, learning how to play and orchestrate music by Ellington and Benny Goodman, as well as Cuban standards. In 1958 he recorded the first ever album for Island Records, and in the 60s, together with legendary Jamaican producer Coxsone Dodd hit upon the shuffling rhythm that became known as ska. Ranglin is the history of Jamaican music incarnate, having lived through the early jazz, R&B boom, and aided and abetted the invention of ska. His melodic jazzy guitar licks and masterful arrangements adorned the first ska tune ever to hit the charts in the UK and USA, Millie Small's "My Boy Lollipop" (1964). In the mid 1970s Ranglin returned to his first passion, jazz, before re-emerging in 1995 with the album Below The Bassline on which he married his love of jazz with his respect for the drum and bass groove of his native Jamaica. The Ernest Ranglin catalogue also includes Memories of Barber Mack (1997) with Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare, a delightful stew of jazz, blues, reggae and old Jamaican mento; In Search of the Lost Riddim (1998); and Gotcha! (2001, on Telarc), which features a stunning line up including Steve Jordan, Anthony Jackson and Warren Bernhardt. In the summer of 2002 Ernest recorded an album with the Jazz Pioneers and the Mahotella Queens in South Africa, which is due for release in April of this year. He also played on St. Germain's recording Tourist (2001) which sold more than 2 million copies internationally.

Full media release here.

MEDIA RELEASE 20 JANUARY 2003
ADELAIDE SOUTH AUSTRALIA

- Full program announced - 350 performers from 31 countries
- 3 days and nights March 7-9, 2003, Botanic Park, Adelaide
- All tickets now on sale

Details of the full program for WOMADelaide 2003, Australia’s critically acclaimed and much loved festival, were released today - 350 artists from 31 countries, performing across six stages over three glorious summer days and nights in Botanic Park, March 7-9.

Celebrating ten years of WOMAD (the international music festival) in Australia, this year’s $2.5 million WOMADelaide festival sees one of the largest gatherings of artists to date from countries as far afield as Mexico, Senegal, Pakistan, Colombia, Algeria, Russia, South Africa, UK, Canada, Japan, and from across Australia.

Get ready for a weekend of unforgettable live performances from some of the world’s finest musicians at this year’s festival. Joining the artist line-up already announced, which features Algerian rocker Rachid Taha; Mexico's Latino punk band Los de Abajo and Cuba’s legendary Cachaíto López, are: from France with origins in the West Indies and Benin, the African pop-groove of the charismatic Julien Jacob; spellbinding, high-energy performance from Burkina Faso eight-piece percussion and dance ensemble Badenya les Frères Coulibaly; from the north of Spain, the Asturian/Celtic bagpipe and fiddle-driven rhythms of Felpeyu; composer, musician, singer, storyteller and South African national treasure, the Queen and muse of Mpondoland, Madosini; country, soul and blues from one of Australia’s premier indigenous singer-songwriters Kerrianne Cox; young, dynamic French Canadian six-piece La Volée d’Castors; and the premiere of a specially created new work by Australian Dance Theatre – on a roll after taking out a number of national dance awards and a highly successful American tour, and many more artists.

Add to that fabulous line-up the ever popular free on-site workshop program; the child-friendly KidZone, a treat for all the family; the late-night WOMADelaide club, WoZone, featuring a wild line-up of international and Australian DJs; cheeky, entertaining roving performers; visual arts, special site projects; the global village of arts and crafts, delicious food and cooling ales.

Full media release here.

MEDIA RELEASE 8 AUGUST 2002
ADELAIDE SOUTH AUSTRALIA

On your toes for WOMADelaide 2003 - it’s just around the corner and next month’s special event, the WOMAD WARM-UP is a taste of what`s to come. WOMAD artists from Australia, Brazil, Cameroon, Ghana, Senegal and Zimbabwe en-route from the WOMAD Singapore Festival will arrive in Adelaide next month for four days of exclusive concert performances, workshops and master classes.

Twenty-two of the world`s most outstanding musicians and artists including Cameroon’s Sally Nyolo; recently reformed Brazilian supergroup of the 70s Trio Mocotó and Zimbabwe’s master of the mbira Chartwell Dutiro, present three concerts and three workshops in the intimate surroundings of the Dunstan Playhouse and the Space Theatre on Friday 6 & Saturday 7 September. In the lead up to these public concerts, the WOMAD artists will conduct a series of workshops for primary and secondary schools and music students.

The WOMAD WARM-UP is presented by the Adelaide Festival Centre in association with WOMAD Singapore and is a special programming initiative supporting the announcement made by South Australia’s Premier and Arts Minister Mike Rann, earlier this year, that Adelaide would stage an annual Womad event.

Adelaide Festival Centre Chief Executive Officer, Kate Brennan, said "We are pleased to present this very special event in association with WOMAD Singapore and proud that as WOMADelaide shifts to it’s annual cycle, this special Womad event is so strongly supporting the development of young South Australian musicians and artists".

LONDON Monday 17 June 2002

Premier and Arts Minister Mike Rann has signed an agreement in England today to secure the future of the WOMADelaide Festival.

Mr Rann and Womad’s Artistic Director and Joint Founder Thomas Brooman reached agreement to secure WOMADelaide until 2009.

The agreement was signed at former Genesis star Peter Gabriel’s Real World studios near Bath in Wiltshire, England.

"The new agreement will turn the biennial festival into a yearly event. Other yearly Womads are held in England, Greece, Spain and Italy. A San Francisco Womad is also being planned.

"Womad has been an outstanding festival for Adelaide, generating millions of dollars of economic benefits in terms of tourism since it started. It has also been a tremendous success artistically and has helped promote Aboriginal music as well as the music and dance of many nations and cultures.

"South Australia’s contract with Womad was coming to an end and we didn’t want it poached by another State. The agreement I reached today with ’Womad in the Park’ means that WOMADelaide’s future is secure.

"We will kick off with a special event and workshop in September involving international and local artists and SA schools, followed by a full WOMADelaide next year.

"I want our new International Film Festival to precede or follow WOMADelaide so that in alternate years to the Adelaide Festival, we will have back to back world class events. In the Festival years, there will be a smaller Womad event so as to compliment but not compete with the Adelaide Festival of Arts." Mr Rann said.