Womad Singapore is now in its 10th year, but for organiser Sarah Martin, who has been involved with the festival since 1999, the years have passed in the blink of an eye.
'I've worked all of my adult life for Womad and it's flashed by,' Martin says. 'The first few years were pretty tough because Womad was an event that featured artists that nobody knew about. Technically, there were also many challenges because it was outdoors and had multiple stages, with groups bringing down instruments most people had never seen.'
This year's Womad Singapore remains true to its credo of presenting musical diversity and introducing new styles. From British electronic act Asian Dub Foundation to Senegalese performer Youssou N'Dour (right) and British-Indian singer Sheila Chandra, festival goers can expect to enjoy a mixture of reggae, Brazilian samba-rock and Senegalese hip hop, as well as discovering nomad desert blues from Niger and the rich musical sounds of Iran.
Martin says Womad has never been about the tried and tested. 'It's a discovery process and the enjoyment of an unexpected artist or style of music that you might never, ever otherwise encounter.'
The festival will start on Friday with a performance by hip beat-makers Asian Dub Foundation (below). The uplifting and energetic alternative electronica band are known for their politically engaged lyrics and vocal stance against racism, and have been described by some as a combination of Rage Against the Machine and Bombay the Hard Way. They've been together since 1993, and their distinctive sound is a combination of hard ragga-jungle rhythms, indo-dub bass lines, searing sitar-inspired guitars and traditional sounds gleaned from their parents' record collections, shot through with fast-chat conscious lyrics.
Another performance that night will be a set by Chandra, who likes to experiment by using her voice as an instrument. She says she doesn't have specific influences. 'I just go with what interests me in what I'm playing with musically at the time, which may be as simple as a specific tone, vowel sound or 'trick' of two or three notes.'
Revellers will also hear the samba-rock sound of Clube do Balanco of Brazil; the contemporary folk sounds of Scottish band Shooglenifty playing a fusion of fiddle, banjo, bass, mandolin, acoustic and electric guitars, percussions and piano; and the evocative sounds of the nomadic cultures of the Wodaabe and Tuareg (desert nomad) peoples of Niger performed by Etran Finatawa. Formed in 2004, the group (the name means 'the stars of tradition') blends traditional African percussions, such as calebasse, tende drum and leg bells, with modern guitars and bass, says their manager, Sandra Vanedig.