Music Institutions and Festivals
The main music festival in Barbados is crop over, which is celebrated with song, dance, calypso tent competitions and parades, especially leading up to the first Monday in August, Kadooment Day. The crop over festival celebrates the end of the sugarcane harvest, and is inaugurated by the ritual delivery of the last of the harvest on a cart pulled by mules. The champion sugarcane workers are crowned King and Queen for the event. In addition to crop over, music plays an important role in many other Barbadian holidays and festivals. The Easter Oistins Fish Festival, for example features a street party with music to celebrate the signing of the Charter of Barbados and the fishing industry of the island, and the Holetown Festival, which commemorates the arrival of the first settlers in 1627. Opera, cabaret and sports are a major part of the Easter Holders Season. On 30 November, the Barbadian Independence Day, military bands in parades play marches, calypsos and other popular songs. This is preceded for several weeks by the National Independence Festival of Creative Arts. The National Independence Festival of Creative Arts and Crop Over are two of the festivals sponsored by the National Cultural Foundation (NCF); the other is Congaline, a recently-organized street party that begins in April and ends on May Day. NCF also assists with the Holers Opera Season, Oistins Fish Festival, Holetown Festival and the B'dos Jazz Festival.
Other major musical institutions in Barbados include the Barbados Chamber Orchestra and the Cavite Choral. There are also dance and ballet groups known as Dance National Afrique, Barbados Dance Theatre Company, Dance Strides, The Dance Place and Dancing Africa. The island's music industry is home to several recording studios, the largest being Blue Wave, a 48-track system, and Paradise Alley, a 24-track system. Others include Chambers' Studio, Gray Lizard Productions and Ocean Lab Studios.
Read more about this topic: Music Of Barbados
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