It’s become a highly anticipated event in el Valle, a true festival for locals. Another Festival de la Quinta has come and gone in Valledupar. Something about this time of year generates a feeling of nostalgia surrounding the festival. One must not suffer through the suffocating heat and rain that plagues the Festival Vallenato. Instead, the weather these past years has been refreshingly cool during the weekend-long festival.
So far, I have attended Festival de la Quinta in its 3 installments, but this year was different than the last two years. The first year, I had every interest of going an entire day, Saturday. I’m not sure it was a two day or 3 day event then. However, the person I was supposed to go with never showed up, forcing me to go later with other friends and missing most of the shows. I pretty much showed up, took some pictures in the streets with my friends and left to go eat. No real memorable experiences to be shared.
But as I talked about in a previous post, last year was a different experience entirely, a more immersive, folkloric event, like the beginnings of a ritual I hope to continue every year. I made new friends and completely immersed myself in local culture, the spontaneity of walking down the street and being embraced by new and relatively old friends, dancing and drinking in the streets, and finding out just how much this city is growing.
This year, the narrow streets seemed even more packed. Turn out was huge, however there was an area they did not use this year, and most of the music was focused on the big main stage and a smaller set up on the corner nearby where the La Espinita restaurant is. Some commented that this year it was less organized than last year. While they were partly right, if they knew the struggle that took place behind the scenes for La Quinta to get funding from the city, the conflicts between certain organizers that come together to make the festival happen, then it is all too clear why this organizational lapse was felt.
Palenke itself has also been undergoing a remodeling process to continue promoting itself as a multi-faceted cultural space within the city. Some neighbors focus more on the revenue and bar life, but Palenke’s cerebral mission is part of what makes it such an incredibly enriching place to begin with. It is far from “just a bar” – it is a space made up of heritage, especially the Afro- and indigenous contributions to Colombian culture. That being said, the bar was just reopening and not completely set up in the back, so this year there were no major performances to go to in Palenke after the live music stopped in the streets. That was something I missed greatly, as that music was what kept the atmosphere going. For me, nothing beats live music.
In the festival itself, a lot of local bands got to take to the stage to perform for a stuffed street full of spectators. Because of my personal connection to Monofonico (myboyfriendisinthebandcough*) I focused on their performance and showed up just in time to get a front row view of their performance. What sets Monofonico apart is the blend of talent, charisma, and passion with which they fill their performances. I never get tired of watching them – and no, I swear, zero personal bias on my part. They play lots of champeta classics (El Sayayin’s Paola, La invite, some salsa like Centurion de la Noche by Joe Arroyo) and take some urban and Afrocaribbean songs and put their own spin on them as well.
Other bands that can never be missed was Sr. Gustavo, another champeta group that has been on the scene in Valledupar for a while now, and a new rock band called Veneno. Their style is a classic rock en espanol sort of vibe with clear, heavy vocals and throbbing instrumentation to hold it together. All of the bands that played the main stage came alive with excellent lighting that filled the street with colors contained by the umbrellas suspended above the streets. Seeing the way the youth of Valledupar flock together and become powered by the music and the atmosphere causes a sort of nostalgic feeling of being in a place where there is still hope, where things still feel fresh.
Apart from the music, I did more poking around in the art and vendors area. Because I’m gringa I noticed I got some special attention. They were really trying to sell me their art in the artist hall and travel packages, assuming I was vacationing. All the same, I tried to take in as much information as I could manage in the short time I was there. I learned about some wonderful eco-tours that have began in areas that used to be heavily affected by the civil conflict in the Colombian countryside. Most locals would not go to these areas because of stigma related to the guerrillas, so now they are trying to attract visitors to explore and learn about a different side of Colombia while supporting the communities with the money spent and appreciating the beauty violence could not erase.
The local art scene is an old institution important to people from this region of Colombia. Any house you go into will be adorned with a large still life painting hanging in the living room, usually elaborated by a local artist. I was invited to a local studio to check out the art after admiring both modern and classic styles on display in a university building located within the festival grounds.
Check out some of the pictures I took. Even with the rainy season climate and some organizational and logical problems, the overall vibe of the festival was positive and forward thinking, a new tradition establishing itself in Downtown Valledupar.
((pics to be added – I just had this post in my drafts for waaaay too long – time to continue)
Diario de una Aventurera 