In 1995 the first edition of Rock al Parque (RAP) was created, a festival of pure Rock with bands of Colombia and a couple of foreign groups. Metal, Punk, Ska and 
Alternative sounds were reunited in the principal squares and parks of Bogotá, four days of pure Rock, all for free in an atmosphere of coexistence and integration between the young.
Sixteen years after, we can see an evolved festival, bigger and stronger than ever. A lot of international bands, 300.000 attendants, more or less, in three days are the result of the last edition of RAP. But in this process, a lot of things have changed: Too many genres in only one festival, the same national bands every year with the same musical proposal, a new capitalist spirit with a lot of sponsors instead of the old spirit of coexistence, these are only a couple of problems that we can see, fully explained in the next lines.
First, a couple of years ago the organization of RAP started to open the quantity of sub-genres of the festival. Electronic, Avant-Garde and Tropical music are the new guests in a Rock Festival. It sounds absurd to combine bands of pure thrash metal as Destruction, with tropical groups as Choc Quib Town in the same festival. Maybe the organization has to think in a new festival with electronic and tropical sounds, instead of putting together bands and genres that you can’t mix.
Another problem that you can see in RAP is the repetition of the same bands every year. A situation that people call “Rosca al Parque”. A corrupted situation that indicates the contamination of the organization: Influences, dirty money and the same national bands playing year over year, taking away the opportunity to new bands to show their musical proposals.
RAP can’t become in another example of rottenness, decay and vitiation that every day we 
listen on the radio, we watch on the T.V. and we read on the newspaper. A big change in the organizers or a democratic process to select the bands, are solutions that the district administration maybe has to think to purge the corruption inside the festival.
Linked to the problem above, we have the situation with the sponsors. Multinational and big companies put their eyes in RAP as a market strategy, because the festival reunites hundreds and hundreds of young people. With a lot of money, the organizers have to pay favors to the companies, promoting commercial bands and the vice circle continues. Coexistence and integration between the youth isn’t the purpose. Now the goal is only marketing and exploiting a musical festival to sell and promote things.
A decadent festival doomed in their new commercial direction, a soulless project that only has the advantage of being free.
I did not know about those things happening at the festivals. I think it is a good idea to have more young people worried about those pieces of information that we never know because what appears on the news is something different. If this information is spread maybe they can start thinking about the real purpose of the festivals. Well done.
ResponderEliminari don't know to much about this topic but, i think that it's good that the people have opinions about this things ,that have to be cultural and good for the people not to benefit companies or corrupt people.
ResponderEliminarI disagree with some ideas in this article, for example Choc Quib Town is not a Tropical group, they are a Hip Hop and Alternative Colombian group, it's different that they use typical instruments, and in different festivals around the world have different kind of bands, like "Rock in Rio".
ResponderEliminar