Africa Remix Theory and Practice

african-remix

I’m headed off to Boston into a snowstorm that may leave me stranded, but I have the pleasure to be participating in two very exciting events this weekend, making it well worth the travel madness.

First up is the Africa Remix Conference, where I’ll be participating in a panel entitled Producing Global Sounds alongside José da Silva from the LUSAFRICA label, Ben Herson from Nomadic Wax, and Patricia J. Tang from MIT.

The conference’s goal is to:

probe the global circulation of African musics in the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, featuring presentations by major producers of African sound recordings, discussions with presenters of African musical performances live and mediated, and insights from and a performance by musicians who are themselves engaged in the process of remixing African music worldwide.

There will be some interesting panel topics, including one on that age old debate about appropriation of which will be chaired by Wayne. He promises to try to throw some loops into the discussion, so I’m looking forward. Another highlight will be a performance by Debo Band.

UPDATE: The Debo Band concert and Picó Picante are both cancelled because of the snowstorm. But the conference will on and live tomorrow morning!

After the conference the Picó Picante crowd has so graciously invited me back to spin alongside them and the one King Louie from Peligrosa fam down in Texas. If you haven’t picked up his Screwmbia EP (Tejano Remix) alongside Principe CU (A.B. Quintanilla’s son, and Selena’s nephew!) do yourself a favor and grab it now: