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WOMEX PRESS INFORMATION
19 July 2017 - for immediate publication



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The Most Southern WOMEX Ever: 
WOMEX 18 to take place in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria


Berlin/Las Palmas: WOMEX – the World Music Expo – will take place on the Canary Islands in 2018. The most important conference and showcase festival for global music travels to the city of Las Palmas on Gran Canaria island as WOMEX organisers Piranha Arts and the local administrations announced Friday last week.
 
Three months before WOMEX 17 is to take place in Katowice, Poland, this October, organisers have already announced the dates and host city for the following edition in 2018:

WOMEX 18
24-28 October 2018 | Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Canary Islands, Spain

Las Palmas is a culturally-active hub on the island of Gran Canaria, and the capital of the canary islands, which belong to Spain but are located in the Atlantic Ocean near to the West African coast and are part of Macaronesia, a collection of the archipelagos of the Canaries, the Azores, Madeira and Cabo Verde. 

This will make the 24th edition the most southern WOMEX ever – WOMEX always takes place in a European city, and Las Palmas is as southerly a city in Europe as there comes.

The project will be mounted together with local companies as production partners, as well as with the experienced Spanish WOMEX partners Mirmidón and Nordesía, who have already hosted WOMEX editions in 2014 and 2016 in Santiago de Compostela.

The event enjoys the full support of the local administrations on all levels: the regional government of Canary Islands (Gobierno), the island's administration (Cabildo de Gran Canaria) and the City Council itself. 

 
As Paul Bräuer, head of communictations of WOMEX, pointed out at a press conference in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria together with representatives of all parties involved:
 
"It is both our honour and our delight to announce the WOMEX 18 host city of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. It will be an absolute joy to come here with our community of music professionals, learn about the regional culture and its connections and make our Canarian friends become a part of the WOMEX family."
 

Click here for these and more photos for press use only


German Lopez - Canarian showcase artist WOMEX 15 (by Jacob Crawfurd)

Watch his performance at WOMEX 15
 

Las Palmas de Gran Canaria -
Vivid culture & great infrastructure in the most southerly host city possible


Las Palmas de Gran Canaria will become the capital of global music, when WOMEX – the World Music Expo takes place there 24-28 October 2018. The city is an excellent fit for the 2,400 expected music professionals: global and intercultural exchange is second nature to the European Canary Islands, with their proximity to the Maghreb and Sub-Saharan Africa and long-term cultural ties to Latin America.

Gran Canaria being a touristic hotspot with its 'infinite summer' (a very stable climate and record numbers of sunny days per year), the island features a perfect infrastructure with an international airport just 20 minutes away from Las Palmas, an abundancy of hotels and apartments, a well-functioning public transport system and low prices by European standards.

What is even more important is the good cultural infrastructure: the beautiful coastal town of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria (one of the main cities of the Canarian archipelago) features independent theatres, clubs and cinemas, a respectable cultural scene and a colourful old town providing a vivid city night life. The WOMEX 18 main venues will be the inner city INFECAR exhibition space for the daytime expo and conference and the Auditorio Alfredo Kraus (named after a famous Canarian tenor) for the showcase festival, boasting several state of the art concert halls and a main hall with a glass backdrop that gives way to a wonderful view of the ocean.

Stretching across the Northeastern corner of Gran Canaria island, the city offers beaches on both the east and the west side of the town – one of the few cities in the world which has seaside sunrise as well as sunset on display! As the most southern city of Europe, Las Palmas will not fail to delight the WOMEXicans, as the professional delegates coming from over 90 countries to WOMEX are called.

Read general information about WOMEX below.
Announcing WOMEX 18 from left to right: Aurora Moreno (general director of cultural promotion of the Gobierno de Gran Canarias), Antonio Morales, presidente del Cabildo Insular de Gran Canaria, Augusto Hidalgo, alcalde de Las Palmas de Gran Canaria and Paul Bräuer, director of communication Piranha Arts (WOMEX organiser)
 



BACKGROUND: What is WOMEX?

WOMEX – the World Music Expo – is the most international music meeting in the world and the biggest conference of the global music scene, featuring a trade fair, talks, films and a showcase festival.

Around 2,400 professionals come together every October from more than 90 countries, making WOMEX not only the number one networking platform for the world music industry, but also the most diverse music meeting worldwide. Its musical spectrum is unparalleled in the international showcase festival scene, ranging from the most traditional to the new global local underground, embracing folk, roots, local and diaspora cultures and urban and electronic sounds from all over the globe as well as all musical juxtapositions of these. Jazz and classical are explicitly welcomed!

7 stages, 700+ exhibiting companies, 80 speakers, films, an opening concert and an award ceremony across five packed networking days and rather short nights.

Since 1994 WOMEX has been travelling all across Europe from Berlin (1994), via Brussels (1995), Marseille (1997), Stockholm (1998), Berlin (1999 + 2000), Rotterdam (2001), Essen (2002 + 2004), Newcastle (2005), Sevilla (2003 + 2006 - 2008), Copenhagen (2009-2011), Thessaloniki (2012) to Cardiff (2013), Budapest (2015) and Santiago de Compostela (2014 + 2016).

The 23nd edition of WOMEX will take place in the UNESCO city of music Katowice, Silesia, Poland, from Wednesday, 25 to Sunday, 29 October 2017. 

The 24th edition of WOMEX will take place in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, Spain, from Wednesday, 24 to Sunday, 28 October 2018.

www.womex.com

Photo credits:

Bengt Nyman, German Lopez by Jacob Crawfurd, Auditorio Alfredo Kraus, Il Collectionista de Instant, Bengt Nyman
Next to WOMEX, the Piranha Arts event portfolio also includes Classical:NEXT, the global meeting for all art music innovators (next edition Rotterdam, The Netherlands, 17 - 20 May 2017);
 
plus worldwide consultancy & special projects such as:
 
- Atlantic Music Expo (Praia, Cabo Verde, 10-13 April 2017);
- Sound of the Xity (Beijing, China, 26-28 April 2017),
- Primera Linea (Havana, Cuba, 20 - 23 September 2017);
- Circulart (Medellín, Colombia, 9 - 12 November 2017); 
 
Press contact WOMEX
Paul Bräuer
T: +49 (0) 30 31 861 448 | E: paul.braeuer@piranha-arts.com
 
Photos and more material at our press section: www.womex.com/press
 
WOMEX online:
www.womex.com
facebook.com/worldmusicexpo | twitter.com/womex | youtube.com/WOMEXpiranha

Copyright © 2017 Piranha Arts, All rights reserved.


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