Canadian and international music icons Lights and Magic! will headline the 4th annual Richmond World Festival. Presented by Coast Capital Savings, the nationally award-winning festival will once again present a smorgasbord of music, arts, food and culture from around the globe on Friday, August 31 and Saturday, September 1 in Richmond’s Minoru Park. Admission is free.
“Richmond is recognized internationally as a model for cultural diversity and harmony,” said Richmond Mayor Malcolm Brodie. “The Richmond World Festival celebrates that diversity and we’re excited to present a stellar line-up of music, food and the arts that showcases our many cultures, our community and Canada at their best.”
The festival will feature over 90 artists performing on nine stages, serving up rich slices of African, Asian, North and South American, European, South Pacific and Caribbean cultures. Other highlights include the FEASTival of Flavours with more than 50 food trucks presenting cuisines from all over the globe and the Culinary Stage featuring top local chefs. There’s also the Global Village with interactive cultural activities and performances; the Bamboo Theatre and Digital Carnival, both offering diverse and innovative performances; Africa Zone cultural pavilion, Artisan Marketplace and Imagination World at the Richmond Public Library.
Headlining the main stage on Friday, August 31, Lights is a riveting performer and innovative songwriter. Always pushing boundaries, the alt-pop phenomenon has never shied away from a challenge. Through her first three records, Lights built an incredibly passionate fanbase, selling out tours around the world, earning 100 million U.S. streams and two JUNO Awards, not to mention the more than two million rabid fans who follow her every move online.
Then came En, short for Enaia, a fictional character from a fictional world created in Lights’ imagination that is not altogether different from herself. Throughout a year long process, she began secretly working on an unprecedented idea writing and drawing her own comic book based around this alter ego of sorts. And on top of that, just to make things more difficult – an album to coincide with the whole thing. Thus came Skin&Earth, the Canadian singer’s ground breaking fourth record, her most open and vulnerable to date, winning millions of new fans and more critical acclaim.
Magic! is a Toronto-bred, Los-Angeles-based quartet who scored the song of the summer, Rude – a buoyant reggae-pop tune that held the No. 1 spot on the Billboard Hot 100 for six weeks, charted in 41 countries, sold more than ten million singles and boasts over one billion views on VEVO. Now, Magic! is back with the smash hit Kiss Me and gearing up for the release of their next single Core and third album Love & Ego this fall.
Magic! has established itself as a bonafide sensation thanks to its undeniably catchy sound, superlative songwriting, and masterful musicianship. The band, which includes lead singer Nasri, guitarist Mark Pelli, drummer Alex Tanas, and bassist Ben Spivak, released Primary Colours in 2016 with the Caribbean-tinged Lay You Down Easy (featuring Sean Paul), which debuted at No. 1 on Billboard’s Reggae Digital Songs chart and racked up two million Spotify streams and one million VEVO views in its first two weeks. Magic! will headline the Richmond World Festival main stage on Saturday, September 1.
Also performing on the main stage on September 1 will be platinum-certified up-and-coming Canadian duo Elijah Woods x Jamie Fine. Comprised of instrumentalist/composer Elijah Woods and lyricist/vocalist Jamie Fine, EWxJF are the season one/week two winner of CTV’s The Launch and second chosen artist to release a new original song (Ain’t Easy), which has garnered over 12 million streams to date worldwide. The duo purposefully breaches the boundaries of pop music – touching on so many influences including pop, dancehall, hip-hop and jazz.
Serving up their self-proclaimed “immigrant bass music”, Desi Sub Culture will encapsulate the spirit of the Richmond World Festival, when they hit the main stage on Friday, August 31. “We are a nation of immigrants and we need a new narrative. The world we see on stage, on TV, in Hollywood and Bollywood movies, does not represent the real world. The real world is brown, black, white, yellow, red, and beige. It’s complicated. We are the kids of Asian immigrants. We grew up listening to Run DMC and Apna Sangeet. We celebrated Christmas like everyone else, except our big dinner was chicken curry and roti. We grew up between worlds. Our music is the musical version of ourselves, our upbringing, our identity.”
The Richmond World Festival takes place from 4 to 10 p.m. on Friday, August 31 and from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. on Saturday, September 1. The festival is produced by the City of Richmond and presented by Coast Capital Savings. Stage and zone sponsors include Vancouver International Airport (YVR), Tourism Richmond, Cowell Auto Group, CF Richmond Centre and Vanprop Investments Ltd. Community sponsors are Kwantlen Polytechnic University, FortisBC, and SunLife Financial Richmond Financial Centre. Accommodation sponsor is Sheraton Vancouver Airport Hotel. Media sponsors are CTV, 94.5 Virgin Radio, Richmond News, Georgia Straight, Kiss Radio, AM 1320 102.7 The Peak, Z95.3, and Miss 604.
Watch for additional event details to be announced soon at www.richmondworldfestival.com and for updates, follow @FunRichmond on Twitter, #RichmondWorldFest.
