The Garifuna Collective is going to Spain next month for the World Music Expo, WOMEX. It was finalized today after NICH handed over a check of $30,000 Belize dollars to the band to foot the remaining trip expenses. The band has been rallying for support since June and they are finally set to go. But it goes beyond the cash, the Garifuna Collectives and NICH signed an MOU in Belmopan that will extend this WOMEX experience to other Belizean artists who are craving an opportunity like this. NICH also signed an MOU with the Belize Music Agency. We were there for the signing.
Dr. John Morris - Interim President, NICH
"NICH has as one of its goal as an enabling environment, we want to work with the creative industry, provide funds, provide expertise, provide research, provide documentation all those kinds of things and I think too often we don’t collaborate or create these MOU’s so we can know exactly where we are going."
Al Ovando - Road Manager, Garifuna Collective
"This one with NICH entails, the MOU is just like I said before. They are giving us the balance of the money that was needed to go to WOMEX which for the Garifuna Collective is like $10,000 and the $20,000 is for the showcase section of WOMEX which is the Trade Fair aspect, getting the booth, getting all the peripherals you need for the booth, the people in the booths to be there every day and everything else. When we return the understanding we have and the good thing that was brought to us from NICH is that they don’t want to give us anything without knowing how we could benefit off it or how other people can benefit from it so they decided it is only in the form of an MOU that we decide when we come back what you can do for us. So we decided, for the longest the Garifuna Collective we have always been wanting to share our experience with the other artists in Belize, we do it on our own you know but not on a big scale where we confined to where we live or the people we meet. But now this will be a more organized initiative."
James Sanker - Belize Music Agency
"Even though the Garifuna Collective is the highlight of being showcased at a very prestigious WOMEX, we also want to assist other artists to access that market. And so in particular, the Belize Music Agency will be promoting other artists at this place at a booth. This will give other opportunities to other artists for the door that the Garifuna Collective is opening up for other artists to step through that and benefit from it."
Hon. Patrick Faber - Minister of Education & Culture
"I am very very pleased that we are able to sign on to this memorandum of understanding today of course we are always very pleased to support our musicians and so we take great pride in signing today."
The Garifuna Collective’s journey begins on October 16th in Mexico where they have a couple gigs. Then the band flies to Europe on October 22ndand they hit the international stage at WOMEX as the closing act on the 27th.
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