Dvorana Tabor (playground)
26 May
María Valencia, woodwind, percussion, keyboards – Eblis Álvarez, vocals, guitar, bandleader – Alejandro Forero, keyboards – César Quevedo, bass – Mauricio Ramírez, drums – Alejandro Larrahondo, sound
Maverick experimentalism from the wildly adventurous Colombian scene, with enough to keep mainstream audiences happy as well.
Photo © Mariana Reyes
The musical career of Meridian Brothers is a textbook example of how to bring music to a global audience – and how to become a cult band that does not seek to make music by genre but by putting originality and a bold, inventive stage presence to the fore. For that you need to know what you’re doing; happily, bandleader Eblis Álvarez, whose knowledge of the history of traditional Caribbean music is second to none, certainly does.
After completing his studies in Bogota in 1998, he soon found himself at the centre of the ‘neo-tropicalista’ movement. Twenty-five years on, such beacons of good taste as The New York Times and The Guardian are lining up to sing Meridian Brothers’ praises. Álvarez, who will also be familiar to Druga Godba audiences from his appearance with Los Pirañas in 2018, has helped birth a maverick experimental music that is equally welcomed by mainstream audiences. Little wonder, then, that he has attained god-like status on the wildly adventurous Colombian scene.
