A trip around the world

A warm Indian Summer afternoon was the setting for the seventh celebration of Global Union. The free world music festival, put on by Alverno Presents, happens annually at Humboldt Park in Bay View. This year the festival was condensed into a one-day celebration which brought many more world music fans together and really filled the park.

Those who came to one of Milwaukee’s last outdoor parties of the summer, were treated to music from Tunisia, Mexico, Sweden, and Columbia via New York.

Panorama Jazz Band was scheduled to kick off the day, but conflicts prevented them from making it to the festival. In a last minute adjustment, M.A.K.U. Sound System from New York took the stage to perform. An Afro-Colombian band at the center, M.A.K.U shows influences from jazz, rock, hip-hop, punk, alongside Colombian folkloric rhythms.

MC Rai introduced us to his genre-bending style of Chaabi, Rai, Rock, and hip-hop that had much of the crowd on their feet dancing. Born in Tunisia and influenced by the sounds of neighboring Algeria, he has been on the forefront of the next generation of Arabic music.

Former member of the Spanish rock band La Catrina, Rana Santacruz gathered his own musicians from Mexico City and around the world to release his first solo album. From an admiration of the golden age of Mexican cinema, novels by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, musicians like Tom Waits, and American bluegrass, his style of Bluegrass Mariachi was born.

Making their return to Milwaukee was Sweden’s Movits!, though it was their debut on the Global Union Stage. Singing in Swedish, the group’s unique sound combines the worlds of swing music and hip-hop.

If you missed Global Union this year, don’t make that mistake next year. It is a wonderful opportunity to travel the entire world in an afternoon, free of charge.

Photos by Angela Morgan, Lacy Landre and Sarah Dwyer-Olsen. For more ThirdCoast Digest photo galleries, visit our Photo Gallery Page.