Colombia’s ‘La 33’ set to shake Antalya

Emine Kart - ANKARA

A concert featuring Orquesta La 33 (popularly known as La 33), a Colombian salsa music band, will be held in August at EXPO 2016 in the southern resort of Antalya, Colombian Ambassador to Turkey Juan Alfredo Pinto has said.

According to Pinto, Columbia’s La 33 is the best salsa orchestra in the southern hemisphere.

 “The name is La 33. It is considered nowadays probably the best orchestra on the south side of the world,” the ambassador said, with an apparent tone of pride in his voice.

“La 33 is a 30-musician-band and most of them are career musicians and others are coming from the marginal neighborhoods in some cities. And it is also an expression of social integration,” said Pinto.

“Colombian music is one of the variables of [the] internationalization of a country [and] very significant. For example, Shakira is from Colombia, Carlos Vives is from Colombia,” he added.

The Colombian stars on July 8 premiered a clip for their vallenato-reggaeton summer anthem that takes them on a journey along the Caribbean coast of Colombia from Vives’ hometown Santa Marta to Shakira’s Barranquilla, Billboard said last week.

Part of busy Antalya agenda

The concert is only one of the many activities taking place on the sidelines of the Antalya Expo 2016. Legendary rock band Deep Purple already met and their fans in Antalya on July 5 as part of their European tour.

Among other activities staged as part of the EXPO 2016, Turkey’s culture capital hosted the Istanbul Woodwind Festival between June 29 and July 3. The events took place in Istanbul’s Kadıköy district on the Asian side.

Participants also enjoyed seminars, workshops, master classes, movies, exhibitions and contests during the festival, a statement from the organizers said. Some of the artists who have performed during the festival included British jazz saxophonist and composer Andy Sheppard, Turkish clarinet virtuoso Hüsnü Şenlendirici and British clarinetist Nicholas Cox.

The German drama “13 Minutes” also hit Turkish theaters.  Directed by Oliver Hirschbiegel, the film tells the true story of Georg Elser’s failed attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler in 1939. The 2015 film stars Christian Friedel, Katharina Schuttler and Burghart Klaussner.