Lake of Stars Malawi festival annual report

Lake of stars organizers have released a report which highlights a series of events that took place in 2016 as part of the 30^th September to 2^nd October’s main festival.

According to the report, 42 Malawian acts performed, 41 artists and creative practitioners took part in workshops during the event, 80+ volunteers from Malawi powered the festival working across a range of roles, 3010 people attended the festival, media coverage of 550 million and over 30 tourism businesses benefited directly.

Prior to the main festival, a Children Future Festival took place on the 19^th of June at Sunbird Capital Hotel, one of the highlights was when the former British High Commissioner Michael Nevin along with his wife Sawako Nevin and former Deputy Major of Lilongwe Akwame Bandawe jumped on stage with Hip Hop sensation Tay Grin during an explosive performance that had the kids screaming and shouting for more.

“Key themes being covered at this year’s Children Future Festival included highlighting progress in the fulfilment of the President’s 10 commitments for children and youth and raising awareness of the rights and protection of persons with albinism,” reads the report in part.

The report added: “LOS continued to support tourism and specifically sports tourism with its second year involvement in the Porter’s Race. They shared expertise and technical support to the once in a year Mount Mulanje competition that took place on 9^th July. This was the 20^th Anniversary for the race and the experience ended in an Island in Sky Concert that had live music from Lawi and Lulu.”

Action for Adolescents and Youth (A4AY) Community Concert took place at Chintheche Inn in Nkhata Bay on 29^th September followed by “Day of Ideas” which took place the morning of 30^th September before the festival doors officially opened.

“LOS introduced a new element called the ‘Day Of Ideas’ which was designed to inspire the 500 students who attended from the nearby Bandawe schools through a programme of speed networking sessions, panel discussions, an ‘Ideas Tree,’ talks and interactive activities on a range of topics such as gender, leadership, technology in music and climate change,” reads the report.

Other events that Lake of Stars supported throughout the year include Mi Casa concert in June, Tumaini Festival in November and many more.

Will Jameson first visited Malawi for six months in 1998 when he worked in Dwangwa as a volunteer with the Wildlife Society. During that time he travelled to Zimbabwe, Zambia and Mozambique.

On returning to England Will took back with him a souvenir – an empty carton of ‘Chibuku Shake Shake’ beer. Halfway through university at Liverpool John Moores he decided to start a club night with friends Damo Jones, Charlene McDaid and Rich McGinnis. They named the night after the Malawian beer and went on to win Best UK Club in the Mixmag Awards in 2004.

The club gave Will the contacts and experience he needed to develop the LOS festival idea.

 

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