FREE! Donations for La Peña Welcome at the Door!
Doors open at 7:30pm / Event starts at 8pm
The 15th Annual Berkeley World Music Festival opens Friday, June 1st with a FREE kick-off party at La Peña Cultural Center! Please bring cash for food and drinks!
Experience a night in Old San Juan, Puerto Rico at La Peña Cultural Center in South Berkeley! Old San Juan is a sensory experience: Walking along the cobble stone streets, hearing musicians playing outside, the scent of street food wafting through the air. Stepping into night clubs filled with people dancing to salsa, plena, reggaeton and more!
The party features tropical music by:
Pleneros de la Bahia
La Mixta Criolla
DJ José A. Ruíz
Featuring delicious Puerto Rican food & drinks:
FOOD STAND: Cali Rican Catering
CASH BAR featuring Piña Coladas and other cocktails!
ABOUT PLENEROS DE LA BAHIA:
The “Plena” is Puerto Rico’s most popular form of music with a rich history of political activism and documentation of the everyday lives, concerns and humor of working class Puerto Ricans and of every Puerto Rican. Its main instruments are the “pandereta”, an Islamic-derived frame drum held in one hand and played with the other, and the “güícharo”, a gourd scraper of indigenous Taino origin.
Hector Lugo – “El head chef”
Román Ito Carrillo – “El gigante de los cueros”
Sandra Garcia Rivera- “La poeta del güícharo”
Ayla Davila – “La roble del bajo”
Camilo Landau – “El rockero del cuatro”
Javier Navarrette-” La máquina de ritmo”
ABOUT LA MIXTA CRIOLLA:
La Mixta’s repertoire of originals and funky renditions of traditional tunes, features a variety of swinging Caribbean grooves, from plena, bomba, guaracha jíbara, aguinaldo, to merengue, son, rumba, seis, cumbia and salsa. We would like our music and lyrics to inspire you to dance, to sing, and also to think about where we have come from and where we are moving towards as individuals, as a people, as a society, as humans in a shared world.
ABOUT DJ JOSE RUIZ:
DJ José Ruíz (aka MundoMuzik) is a DJ, radio host, promoter, and collector of world music, vinyl, art and all cultural and music ephemera. Jose’s taste in music is very eclectic, unafraid to mix traditional, experimental or folkloric elements in his sets. His confidence and impeccable taste in music is deeply rooted in the time and research he dedicates to learn about the genres he plays. His respect for the origin and tradition of music he loves can be heard in depth as a radio host and felt when he fills the dance floor.
The Berkeley World Music Festival promotes musical traditions as diverse as the people of the Bay, while cultivating the social value of the world’s music and cementing the Bay Area as a center for world music and artistic expression.
