José Calderon tells James Cummings about his journey into world music and what makes it – and this year’s festival – so special.
What is new about this year’s festival and what can people expect?
This is the seventh edition of Trakafest, and this year is very special for us because we have received funding from Visit Malta for the first time.
We contacted them explaining all the work we have done over the last seven years, and they kindly agreed to fund the sound, stage, lights and sound engineer.
We are very proud to receive this help from the government, because it really adds credibility to our events. Our aim is to promote culture; it’s not an event for making profit, it’s about bringing culture.
There are a lot of cultures here in Malta – we are in the middle of Mediterranean surrounded by Europe, the Middle East and Africa. So, this is the best place to create a world music festival.
Tell us about this year
This year we have a colourful lineup; we have Capoeira demonstrations, where the performers sing and dance – it’s like a fight, but through dance performance. And we have music collectives from Brazil, Africa, Senegal, Columbia – and, of course, Malta too.
From Malta, the festival will showcase an afrobeat collective which includes people from across the world including India, Malta, Spain and UK.
And the festival will also feature performances and workshops of Columbian jazz, Columbian folk music, Lebanese belly dancing and Cuban dancing – so, we have a lot of things on offer.
What makes this music special to you?
It is traditional music, folk music. And any type of folk or traditional music, for me, moves something genetically; it’s root music, ancestral music.
The type of music we are celebrating at Trakafest is deeply rooted in culture, so what this music gives to the audience is authenticity. It wasn’t created for commercial gain; it was created for the people, for ceremonies, weddings, festas, even for the rain, for hunting… world music is not a product, it’s about tradition.
How did you get into this music?
My first exposure to world music was Moroccan music, because where I’m from, Seville, we’re close to Morocco and we have a very close relationship with the Moroccan people.
The first time I heard that music, I was very touched; it gave me goosebumps. I had only really heard flamenco before that, so the first time I heard Moroccan music it made me realise how much music there was outside of my culture.
I am almost 47 years old, and back then there was no internet so the first time I heard that music was live. Seeing people playing and singing that music made me cry; I couldn’t look away. I still remember that moment.
I recognised that something ancestral in my blood was calling me, because in the end, we are all together. We all came from the same origins. Now we are a lot of nationalities because of the long years. But before, we were from the same tribes that started to develop differently.
Another time, an African ensemble came to my town because of a Mediterranean project, and I couldn’t believe the powerful energy that was coming from the performers.
After those experiences, I used to take a bus to a music shop 80 kilometres away from my town, to buy vinyl recordings of world music. Then my musical journey started as a player.
I started to study Middle Eastern music, then when I was 26, I moved to Madrid and started to study African, Brazilian and Indian music.
After that, I started travelling to those countries to really get to understand the music better.
What do you focus on now in Malta?
I’ve been running the Trakadum collective for the last eight years, which focuses on Afro-Brazilian and West African drumming. We meet once per week, on Sundays.
I also have an afrobeat collective, featuring musicians from Malta and other countries, and recently started a Mediterranean music project called ‘Echoes’, featuring a Maltese violinist, a qanun [traditional string instrument] player from Turkey and myself playing Middle Eastern and flamenco drums.
Both of those last two projects will perform at this year’s Trakafest.
What do you hope people will take away from this year’s Trakafest?
Positivity, and a lesson about who we are; we are all family, we are all one and everyone is free. We are all going to dance together.
The Trakafest World Music Festival 2025 starts tomorrow, Friday, October 17 and runs until Sunday. The festival takes place at the Malta BMX Indoor Skatepark, Pembroke. For more information, visit the Visit Malta website or the festival page on Instagram.
