Garifuna Collective Heads to British Columbia
The Garifuna Collective has been touring extensively over the past two months, performing in Europe and the United States. The band is presently in Canada, following a ten-day break from its travels. The Canadian leg of the performing trip builds up to the release of their upcoming album, Aban. On Wednesday, Al Ovando stopped by to discuss what can be expected from the group as it makes its way across British Columbia and back into the United States where the Collective is slated to take part in the American Folk Music Festival in Maine.
Al Ovando
Al Ovando, Garifuna Collective
“We’re heading back to Canada today, way up in the Rocky Mountains, you know. In July, we were in Calgary, now we’re going to Invermere and Salmon Arm up in the Rocky Mountains and these festivals have been around for years. Really prestigious festival and we’re happy to be a part of it. We’ll be working with Danny Michel, remember the project with Danny Michel? He’ll be on stage with us. And so we just come back, we really did an amount of work. We came back from Europe [after] five weeks, you know, over nine countries, really beautiful festivals. We came back and we went to Calgary and then the U.S. again. And so this time we’re going to Canada and come back to the northeast United States. We’re playing at a place called Spaces in Portland, Maine and then the next day and a half we go a little farther north to Bangor, Maine where they block off the street in the summertime and what they do is they bring in cultures from all over the world to be part and celebrate with them and, you know, because once those places get cold they can’t do anything much. So they take advantage of the summertime and they do this big celebration, it’s called the American Folk Music Festival. And so, over the years they have been inviting groups to come and all this hard work now is paying off. Paying off in terms of the band, the music we have, being more relevant, having a better space in the world now.”
