The Pacific Arts Alliance

Next month's Fest'Napuan, the 13th since the event began in 1996, will make history in a number of ways.Firstly, the event will now extend to a 5th day, beginning on Wednesday (rather than on Thursday as in past years) and running though to Sunday. Wednesday the 12th of November will be the "Fest'Nalenga", featuring local string bands...

Thursday 13^th, Friday 14^th and Saturday 15^th will be the Fest'Napuan proper, featuring electrified contemporary ‘pop', and Sunday 16^th will be the "Zion Fest" featuring Christian music. The festival has been extended to a 5^th day because of the ever-increasing number of bands wanting to take part. Rather than having a program finishing at 2 or 3 o'clock in the morning on each day, the committee has decided to add an extra day onto the program, thereby bringing the finishing time each day back to midnight or 1.00am.

The second way in which this year's Fest'Napuan will make history is that it will be the first time since the year 2000 that the entire sound system will be sourced locally. In the year 2000, the Fest'Napuan began to use a high quality outdoor sound system that was then unavailable in Vanuatu and which was therefore brought in from Australia for 3 years, and then from New Caledonia for the last 5 years. With funding obtained from a private sponsor last year, and with savings made over the past 3 years, the committee was able last year to purchase all the sound system components required to complement the smaller systems already in-country to create the ideal sound system for the event. The localisation of the sound system will save the event a significant amount of money in hiring fees and freight costs and will enable the Fest'Napuan to hire components from local sound system operators, thereby injecting money into the local music industry and the local economy.

The third way in which this year's Fest'Napuan will make history is that one of the artists performing will be the winner of Radio Australia's new "Pacific Break" competition, which is a competition to identify the best unsigned and undiscovered musicians in the Pacific which has been going on since early this year. The grand prize for the winner of the competition is the opportunity to play live at the Fest Napuan, with all participation costs being covered by Radio Australia. The recognition that has been provided to the Fest'Napuan by Radio Australia through this competition acknowledges the leading role this event is now playing in the Pacific region. The winner of the competition has just been announced, and it is Vanuatu's own "26 Roots", a band from the northern town of Luganville. This is a significant achievement for the band, given the quality of some of the entries in the competition which have been playing on Radio Australia.

The other nine international acts which will be performing this year are "San Lazaro" from Australia, "Mexem", "Simply Roots" and "Routsky" from New Caledonia, "Unity Pacific", "Lei-D-Lee" and "MC Denirows" from New Zealand, and "Jah Roots" and "Zion Praise" from the Solomon Islands. In another first this year, the Solomon Islands group "Zion Praise" will be the first international act to travel to Vanuatu exclusively to participate in the Zion Fest. As has happened in previous years, workshops will be run with young people at Wan Smolbag Theatre by one of the bands, "Unity Pacific". As usual, most of the big-name local bands will be participating, including Alcina Charlie, Alme System, Amel'oza, Diomega, Huarere, Kalja Riddim Klan, Krosrod, Naio and Nauten Band. Making a historic re-appearance will be UP Band.

The Fest'Napuan is a free event for the public and all funds are raised through corporate sponsorship, selling of food-and-kava stalls to the public and other fundraising efforts. Today, most people in Vanuatu, and especially in Port Vila, closely associate Fest'Napuan with its principal sponsors: Unelco, Telecom, Air Vanuatu and the Vanuatu Kaljoral Senta. Other major sponsors include the Australian High Commission, Cooperation regionale Nouvelle Caledonie and the New Zealand High Commission, who assist to bring artists from Australia, New Caledonia and New Zealand respectively to participate each year. Last but not least, Radio Australia, FM107, Radio Vanuatu and Television Blong Vanuatu continue to provide live coverage of the event in Port Vila, nationally and regionally and Vanuatu Online now streams the festival live over the internet.

Fest'Napuan - Background

The first Fest'Napuan was organised in 1996 by the Vanuatu Cultural Centre to commemorate the second National Day of Culture - 17^th November - which had been officially declared by the Government the previous year to celebrate the opening of the new National Museum building on that date in 1995.  Fest'Napuan 1996 was staged in front of the National Museum building, in the purpose-built amphitheatre of the National Cultural Complex, which has now become the event's home.

The name ‘Fest'Napuan' is a combination of two words, the word ‘festival' from English and French, and the word ‘napuan' from one of the languages of the island of Tanna, which means music and dance.  The Fest'Napuan Association is a registered charitable association which aims to generally promote the development of contemporary music in Vanuatu by:

·         providing young people in music groups with the chance to perform in front of a large audience and access to greater public exposure;

·         providing young people in music groups and aspiring musicians with exposure to other bands and other types of music;

·         encouraging Government and private sponsors to recognise and support Vanuatu's contemporary musicians;

·         providing two nights of free top-quality musical entertainment for the people of Port Vila (and the rest of the country) performed by a broad cross-section of local groups and special overseas acts.

The Fest'Napuan is organised by its own committee, all of whom are volunteers.  Each year, the committee has comprised mostly of young people, many of who are musicians themselves and many of whom are unemployed.  Their participation in the organising committee provides them with skills and experience in office management, administration, logistics and organisation that greatly improves their prospects for later employment. In fact, many young people have gone on to successful long-term employment as a result of the experience they have gained from their voluntary involvement in organizing the Fest'Napuan.

Now in its thirteenth year (2008), the Fest'Napuan is recognised nationally as the biggest cultural event of the year. Audience numbers grow each year (last year's estimate was over 40,000 people over the four days) and include increasing numbers of people coming in from the outer islands especially for the event. The Fest'Napuan is also gaining increasing recognition regionally, with bands from New Caledonia, the Solomon Islands, the Fiji Islands, West Papua, Rapa Nui (Easter Island), Papua New Guinea, Australia and New Zealand having participated to date.  In 2004, for the first time, Australia's ABC network recorded and broadcast the event live across the region on Radio Australia, and Radio Australia has continued to cover the event every year since (except for 2007). This year's partnership between the Fest'Napuan Association and the ABC in hosting the winner of the "Pacific Break" competition further solidifies the reputation of the event regionally.

The Fest'Napuan Association is also taking the lead in assisting the development of music in the rural areas of the country. Next year, community-access music rehearsal studios will be opened by the Association in the Provincial centres of Luganville and Lakatoro (in SANMA and MALAMPA Provinces respectively), and hopefully in Lenakel (in TAFEA Province) and Saratamata (PENAMA Province) also. Modelled on the success of the rehearsal studio established in Port Vila in 2002 (the "Bie room"), these rehearsal rooms will meet a substantial demand in the outer islands for access to instruments, a proper sound system and a place to practise for musicians.