More than 200 Senegalese artists performed over the five day festival, which included art and architecture exhibitions, rock, jazz, electronic and traditional music concerts, dance and parades. Highlights were performances by Senegal's most famous musician, Youssou N'Dour, hip-hop from Daara J and Didier Awadi, stand-up comedy from the duo Omar et Fred, African salsa from the Orchestra Baobab and a closing concert with Toure Kunda.

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“Created in 1970, the Baobab rapidly became the official band of a whole country. Its members, commonly recruited from the famous Star Band, come from different ethnic groups which raise the standard of the country’s unification. In the early 1980s, the Senegalese music landscape changed and the band parts. In 2001, it was the director of the World Circuit, Nick Gold, who organised Baobab’s comeback, as he did for the Buena Vista Social Club. Since then, the Latin rhythms — boleros, rumbas, cha-cha… — mixed to African rhythmic roots, the songs in Wolof, French and Spanish have achieved a second youth and the esteem of an audience always surprised by this audacity of shape and content.”
- From the Rio Loco website

The accompaning panorama by photographer Gilles Vidal features Orchestra Baobab, who performed Saturday, June 24, 2006 at the Scéne Pont Neuf - Prairie des Filtres, Toulouse.

Visit Gilles Vidal’s website for six more panos from the festival.
Email Photographer Gilles Vidal: gilles[at]fillesvidal[dot]com

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