WOMAD NZ 2023 First Lineup Announced — Youssou N’Dour, Sampa The Great, Mdou Moctar + More

Welcoming international artists back to Ngāmotu New Plymouth's Bowl of Brooklands and Brooklands Park, WOMAD NZ have followed last month's teaser bill with a gloriously diverse, 22 act strong first official lineup announcement for March 2023. Including both local heroes and global superstars, the multi-stage festival will host such significant figures as Grammy Award-winning icon Youssou N’Dour (once described by Rolling Stone as "perhaps the most famous singer alive" in Senegal and much of Africa) and his band Le Super Étoile de Dakar, Zambian-born / Australia-based rapper Sampa The Great, Saharan guitar innovator Mdou Moctar (Sahal Sounds), Afro-Cuban rock star Cimafunk, and many more must see artists and groups. Happening over eight stages and three nights, dive into the updated details for 2023's World of Music, Arts and Dance festival and keep on the lookout for more announcements...

"WOMAD, first and foremost, is a great festival to enjoy and discover music, arts and dance. But it was born with a purpose and created in response to difficult times. There was apartheid aboard, race riots and terrorism at home in the UK. Our founder Peter Gabrel believed that by bringing great artists together in a family-friendly environment, the audience would forget their fears and prejudices and open their hearts to the music instead... WOMAD and what it stands for feels more important now than ever." — Chief Operating Officer for WOMAD UK, Mike Large

UPDATE: World of Words speakers have been announced for 2022...

WOMAD New Zealand 2023
Friday 17th March to Sunday 19th March - Bowl of Brooklands and Brooklands Park, New Plymouth (all ages)

Featuring... Acapollinations (Aotearoa), ADG7 (South Korea), Avantdale Bowling Club (Aotearoa), Bab L’ Bluz (Morocco/France), Béla Fleck & Abigail Washburn (USA), Cimafunk (Cuba), Constantinople (Canada), Deva Mahal (Aotearoa), Fly My Pretties (Aotearoa), Professor Hinke Osinga (Aotearoa), Justin Adams & Mauro Durante (UK/Italy), Kefaya and Elaha Soroor (Afghanistan/UK), Kita (Aotearoa), Lil O'Brien (Aotearoa), MazbouQ (Aotearoa), Mdou Moctar (Niger), Mudra Dance Company (Aotearoa), Pandit Ronu Majumdar & Dr Jayanthi Kumaresh (India), Rizwan Muazzam Qawwals (Pakistan), Rubi Du ( Aotearoa), Sampa The Great (Zambia), San Salvador (France), The Garifuna Collective (Belize), The Langan Band (Scotland), Youssou N’Dour & Le Super Étoile de Dakar (Senegal)

World Of Words speakers: Anna Fifield, Chris Tse, Daren Kamali, Dick Frizzell, James Nokise, Lil O'Brien, Mad Doggerel Cabaret, Michael Bennett, Penny Ashton, Rose Carlyle, Dr Susette Goldsmith

Full info on artists and speakers + tickets to the three-day camping festival are available now from womad.co.nz

Watch the classic video for Youssou N'Dour's massive 1994 hit '7 Seconds' featuring. Neneh Cherry...

Check out the clip for Sampa The Great's unstoppable 2019 anthem 'Final Form'...

Take in Mdou Moctar's new single 'Ibitilan', from the forthcoming second volume in the Niger EP series...

Experience Cimafunk's 2018 smash hit 'Me Voy'...

Press release:

From; Afghanistan to Zambia, psychedelic rock to incredible vocalists, classical to hip hop, Grammy award-winning to up-and-coming, traditional to contemporary, memoirs to mathematics. Today, WOMAD NZ 2023 has announced 20 new music and dance acts and two World Of Words and OMV STEAM Lab speakers as part of the 2023 festival this March. The festival will celebrate its 20th anniversary at the award-winning Bowl of Brooklands and Brooklands Park in New Plymouth.

These 22 new musicians, dancers and speakers join the already announced brilliant multi-award-winning Korean folk-pop group ADG7, Aotearoa's genre-pushing jazz, hip hop project Avantdale Bowling Club, and modern Occitan troubadours San Salvador from France. Plus, World Of Words speaker Dick Frizzell and OMV STEAM Lab meteorologist Lisa Murray, both from Aotearoa.

More artists and festival announcements are expected in the coming months.

The World of Music, Arts and Dance festival boasts eight stages, each featuring an eclectic and cross-cultural line-up with talented musicians, artists, and inspiring speakers for three days and nights of extraordinary music and culture like nothing else in Aotearoa.

Situated in a natural amphitheatre over a lake, the iconic Bowl stage is a venue with the wow factor. While the Dell Stage is an intimate affair surrounded by gentle native bush. Both The Gables and the Brooklands stages are known for their high energy and late-night sets. The Kunming Garden hosts the World Of Word stage, which celebrates diverse and exciting voices designed to inspire people to think, talk, laugh, listen and learn and the OMV STEAM Lab is a place of wonder where Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts and Mathematics unite, with inventors, innovators and people at the top of their fields pushing boundaries and challenging the status quo. Unique to Aotearoa, Te Paepae proudly hosts Māori Culture workshops and activities, and music, food, and conversation are at the heart of Taste the World.

Loved by all ages, WOMAD NZ 2023 is a worldly fix without leaving the country—the ultimate culmination of sounds, scenery and good vibes.