After 30 years of bringing the best of world music to the festival masses TIM HUGHES finds out how the organisers of Womad are preparing to celebrate the milestone

THIRTY years ago a group of music enthusiasts came up with a new idea for a festival. It involved taking the cream of the planet’s world musicians, and inviting them to play traditional styles of music from each of their countries in the same big old field.

It must have seemed an adventurous – perhaps foolhardy – proposition. Would lovers of Irish folk, for example, also care about Cuban rumba, Brazilian samba, Jamaican roots and Algerian rai?

Fortunately for the organisers, who included Genesis legend Peter Gabriel, they did. Since then the World of Music and Dance festival – or Womad – has gone on to stage musicians from the four corners of the world – showcasing not just such perennial favourites as ska, salsa, tango and Cajun bands, but rarely heard Siberian throat singers, Polynesian nose flute virtuosos, Australian Aborigine singers and American Indian ghost-dancers.

Since its early days the festival has gown, moving site from Shepton Mallet to Bracknell, Reading and, for the past five years, to the beautiful surroundings of Charlton Park, Malmesbury, where it remains. It has also expanded into world music festivals across the planet, from Abu Dhabi to Adelaide. This weekend’s bash is expected to attract 35,000 people.

“We’re just a matter of days away from the greatest show on Earth,” says festival director Chris Smith. “But it’s not taking place in East London, and it’s got nothing to do with sport.

“Womad Festival is the annual coming-together of the planet’s music, all gathered on a country estate in deepest Wiltshire. And this year it’s extra special. Just as a certain sporting event is chalking up its 30th incarnation in the modern era, so too is Womad celebrating its big three-O. And we’ll be pulling out all the stops to make sure it is a memorable milestone and truly celebrates the past three decades while discovering some astonishing new artists.”

Chris admits the festival’s beauty has often arisen from its diverse range of artists – and the magic between them.

“There was a surprising collaboration between Echo & the Bunnymen and the Drummers of Burundi at the first ever Womad in 1982,” he recalls.

“At the time it was said that, collectively, they brought the house down. And literally they did: a sheep shed collapsed under the onslaught of massed Burundi rhythms from an excited crew of new fans.”

And similar energy is expected tomorrow, when the three-day event begins in earnest, after a warm-up tonight. The line-up consists of 78 acts from more than 30 countries fusing everything from English folk to bamboo pipe melodies from the Solomon Islands.

Acts plying their trade on the green acres of Charlton Park include reggae star Jimmy Cliff (of Many Rivers To Cross fame); South Africa’s Hugh Masekela; Cuba’s Buena Vista Social Club; the king of Algerian rai, Khaled, inset right; Nigerian Afrobeat hero Femi Kuti; and Indian troubadour Raghu Dixit.

From closer to home are Led Zeppelin star Robert Plant, inset left, with his Sensational Space Shifters, who meld together the sounds of West Africa, Arabia, the American Deep South and Robert’s native Black Country; folk-pop experimentalist Patrick Wolf, pop-reggae singer Hollie Cook, Mercury-nominated jazz instrumentalists Portico Quartet, acoustic artists Spiro, Devon fiddler Seth Lakeman, British-Asian pop act Cornershop, dub poet Linton Kwesi Johnson, indie-rockers Revere, and Irish balladeer Damien Dempsey.

And that’s not the half of it. There’s also Jamican-Cuban rhythms from Ska-Cubano; Portuguese fado singer Claudia Aurora, Cape Verdean singer-songwriter Michel Montrond, Canadian fiddler Chrissie Crowley, and South African electro artists Spoek Mathambo.

“Womad is a place where borders dissolve and where nationality is rendered unimportant,” says Chris.

“It’s been that way for 30 years now, becoming, in the process, a United Nations of music. Indeed, the world’s festival. And while we welcome the very latest moves and grooves, this is also a haven to those timeless performers who’ve graced many our stages over the decades.

“Womad boasts an extraordinarily stellar line-up this year to help blow out all those candles,” he goes on. “It’s a cliché when, year after year, a festival announces its finest ever line-up, but this year arguably marks our best yet.”

  • Womad takes place this weekend at Charlton Park, Malmesbury. Starting tonight. For tickets and further information, go to womad.org or call the booking line on 0118 960 6060. Adult Weekend Tickets are £135 (£70 for 14-17 year-olds).