Repeating Islands

The Barbados Reggae Festival runs from April 18-25, 2010.  This year the festival will include a fourth event—a party cruise on the Harbour Master on April 24. The festival begins on April 18 with the Digicel Reggae on the Beach (at Carlisle Bay Centre, Bay Street), continues with the Vintage Reggae Show & Dance on April 23 (at the gymnasium of the Garfield Sobers Sports Complex), offers the new party cruise on April 24, and ends with Reggae on the Hill on April 25.

Artists will include Mr. Vegas, Konshens, the Fab 5, Marcia Griffiths, John Holt, Ernie Smith, Ken Lazarus, Maxi Priest, Taurus Riley, Ritchie Spice, Luciano, and Busy Signal. Local artists, such as Buggy, Kirk Browne, Albert Olton, Li’l Rick, Jon Doe, and Admiral, will also perform.

Another new feature at the four-day festival is that reggae lovers will also be getting HIV/AIDS messages through the various media. Chairman of the Caribbean Broadcast Media Partnership (CBMP) on HIV/AIDS, Dr. Carol Jacobs, says that there is a need to get messages out on HIV/AIDS, not just in Barbados but across the region. Other partners in this innovative venture are South Central Entertainment (with their Super Sound Check messages) and reigning Miss Barbados World Leah Marville with her Love Campaign.

Jacobs explains that “We are in an era of what we call AIDS fatigue. . . . So if we’re going to engage our young people, if we’re going to engage our DJs, if we’re going to engage our songwriters, our artistes our entertainers, it must be in a real kind of way. It must be in their world in real time.”

For full articles, see http://www.nationnews.com/news/entertainment/SHOWBIZ-new-reggae-show-copy-for-web and http://www.nationnews.com/news/entertainment/SHOWBIZ-AIDS-messages—reggae-festival-copy-for-web

Photo of Marcia Griffiths from http://www.rollingstone.com/artists/marciagriffiths/photos/collection/photo/2