Wandering Musicians of Durham

One of the oddball things we saw in Durham was a lot of bands in the streets. We never saw any signs or info that there was a festival or some other celebration going on. But it seemed like every square or open space had a band playing. Only now, with the power of internet-enhanced hindsight, do I see that we caught the end of the Brass Durham International Festival.

Near the main theater and cinema we saw a band all in yellow with about ten members. They played a lot of Latin-style songs. But the most amazing and worrying thing about them is how they would dance up to a member of the audience and make them dance along with the band leader. They always encouraged applause for their victims, I mean, volunteers. We didn't watch too long because they started dancing over towards us.

Another band in another square played more danceable tunes, by which I mean swing music. Unfortunately my wife wasn't around, so we couldn't dance to it. But they were great listening anyway.

When I was with my wife and children, we saw a band right after we ate dinner. They looked like this:

They were the best band and sang in Italian!

They sounded like this:



Sorry I don't have any of the names of the bands (except for the last band, La Clique Sur Mer), hopefully I'll be more attentive next time and use the camera more often than at the end. Or we will check the festival schedule ahead of time! Maybe we'll go back next year.