World Music Beats Global Recession

World music gathering WOMEX shrugged off the global recession by attracting 2,250 delegates from 98 countries to Copenhagen Oct. 26-30.

They included 700 concert and festival bookers, 500 labels, publishers and distributors, 600 managers, 250 producers and 300 national and international journalists, including 130 radio broadcasters.

The 17th edition didn’t quite match the 2,440 delegates it attracted in 2010 but the fall in attendance was down less than 8 percent and the organisers are happy at how the annual gathering’s coped with tough times.

The WOMEX Trade Fair bucked the market trend as 700 companies and organisations from 68 countries took exhibition space at the Copenhagen Forum, an 8 percent increase on last year.

Also on the up is the number of acts wanting to showcase at world music’s highest-profile platform, which resulted in 60 acts from 52 countries performing either at the city’s Koncerthuset or the daytime stages at the Forum.

For the third year in a row, the showcase spotlight was brightened by Danish Broadcasting (DR), in cooperation with NRK (Norway), BBC (UK), SR (Sweden) and NOS (The Netherlands) recording large parts of the showcase festival.

The recordings are now available to European Broadcasting Union members and associated stations all over the world.