Hi I'm Gemma Dempsey and welcome to another edition of the Global Gig Guide. This week we'll hear about the White Stripes and the Royal Ballet in London, the African Soul Rebels tour in the UK, Noise Pop in San Francisco, St Jerome's Laneway in Australia and the line-up to Tennessee's Bonnaroo has just been announced; Led Zepplin is involved but not quite as you would expect.
If you are in London and like a bit of ballet with your White Stripes, check out the Royal Ballet's performance of Chroma. This award-winning work by resident choreographer Wayne McGregor is for five couples set to music from the White stripes Aluminium release, orchestrated by Joby Talbot with set designs by architect John Pawson. Also on the bill are two ballets by Kenneth McMillan: Different Drummers and The Rite of Spring. Full details at the Royal Opera House website.
Ballet not your bag but African music is? Then you're in luck as the African Soul Rebels are currently on tour in the UK, featuring the amazing talents of Salif Keita from Mali, Nigerian drummer Tony Allen and Senegal rapper Awadi.
Salif Keita battled the adversity of being born albino to a noble Malian family to go on to become one of the most revered African singers and founder of the Afro-pop sound. Tony Allen is known a co founder of Afro-beat with Fela Kuti, and more recently as part of The Good, The Bad and The Queen. Didier Awadi has spent two decades mixing contemporary American soul with traditional Senegalese music, in particular using samples of speeches by African leaders. For more information about the tour check out the Music Beyond Mainstream website.
Heading across the pond we find Noise Pop in San Francisco. This week-long event takes place at the end of February and is often compared to SXSW for its large line-up of known and emerging artists that perform at various venues around town. This year Noise Pop includes Magnetic Fields, West Indian Girl and The Walkmen. Initially a one night affair 16 years ago, Noise Pop has expanded to 6 days of music, films and art. This year the Pop't Art section features the 'Wish Tree' installation by Yoko Ono and some rare photographs of Elliot Smith by Autumn de Wilde. Noise Pop's grand finale show on March 2 will be the live debut of She & Him, the new project of Zooey Deschanel and M. Ward. Zooey was recently guest DJ with KCRW's Gary Calamar which you can check out on the KCRW website.
From San Francisco we head to Australia for the St. Jerome's Laneway Festival. What began in a back alley in Melbourne four years ago has grown to include inside and outside spaces in Melbourne,Sydney, Brisbane and for the first time in 2008, Adelaide. St. Jerome prides itself in promoting cutting edge artists as well as utilizing urban locations in new and dynamic ways to make it a great live-music experience. This year features Feist , Dan Deacon and local boys The Presets. Australia's traveling street party has already sold out in Sydney and Melbourne so be sure to check out the website and get your ticket ASAP!
And finally the line-up for Bonnaroo has just been announced and includes Willie Nelson, Vampire Weekend and Sigur Ros headlined by Pearl Jam, Kanye West and Metallica. The rumours of an appearance by Led Zepplin are not true, but you will be able to catch Robert Plant with Alison Krauss as well as the all female tribute band Lez Zepplin!
That's it for another edition of the Global Gig Guide. If you want to hear it again you can download it as a podcast on KCRW.com or iTunes.
Otherwise check back with us next week for more information on global gigging.