Marrakech Is Getting Ready to Host the 2nd “Beat Hotel” Festival

The Beat Hotel Festival returns for a second edition scheduled from March 19 to 22 in Marrakech. It is in the spaces of the Fellah Hotel that the event will offer a series of live shows/concerts, DJ sets, culinary collaborations as well as screenings, workshops and conferences.

The musical program includes slow-groove sessions during the day, live shows/concerts at sunset, and label showcases in the evenings, featuring rising Moroccan talent and international celebrities.

Beat Hotel offers four live shows/concerts. The show will start with British musician and synthesizer Sam Shepherd performing under the name Floating Points. He will present his brand new audiovisual show, with breathtaking projections, produced in collaboration with the Hamill Industries collective. He will be joined on stage by English poet, playwright and rapper Kate Tempest, Franco-Belgian R&B singer Charlotte Adigéry, and English groove singer Kindness.

On the Moroccan side, the wealth and heritage of the Gnaoui culture will be represented by the Mâalem Houssam Gania concert, while Moulay Ahmed El Hassani will fuse Moroccan folk music with psychedelic guitar and rhythm box.

The English Afro-funk electronic music group Ibibio Sound Machine will offer a concert with the magic of African sounds.

On the DJ side, a large part of Beat Hotel’s programming is dedicated to national artists. Festival-goers will have an appointment with the talented DJ Yasmean, the DJ prodigy Abdellah M. Hassak, alias Guedra Guedra, who mixes dub ambiances and traditional music; the ethnic-electronic style of the Sound of Mint duo, as well as the Casa Voyager collective, which will be represented by Djs Polyswitch, Malika, Driss Bennis and Jessin.

Welcoming artists from all over the world, Beat Hotel offers an array of DJs representing the spectrum of alternative sounds. There will be sets by Catalan DJ and producer John Talabot, Jazz Ambassador DJ Gilles Peterson, and favorite DJs from Dutch clubs Carista and Young Marco. Other international artists will bring their musical identities to this second edition. They include DJ Tennis (Italy) from the Life & Death Label, the hypnotic techno Call Super (UK); the Madrid sound of Pional (Spain), the Chinese DJ and composer Yu Su, DJ Khidja, straight from Bucharest, the Lithuanian Manfredas, the unmistakable specialist in Arabic-speaking music Habibi Funk (Berlin), and the leader of the famous German label Disco Halal, Moscoman.

Beat Hotel will also host the legendary British DJ Andrew Weatherall, who will present alongside Sean Johnston (UK) a six-hour set entitled “A Love From Outer Space”.

To plunge into the eclectic corners of visual art and pop culture, the musical line-up will be complemented by a cultural program. Lectures, workshops and screenings will be led by renowned artists: British conceptual artist Jeremy Deller, practicing video art and installation; producer and director Richard Russell, Moroccan pop art pioneer Hassan Hajjaj and young and talented Moroccan photographer Ismail Zaidy.

As a preview of its second edition, Beat Hotel is organizing a tour of “Warm up evenings” from 6 to 8 February in Casablanca, Marrakech and Rabat.

Be the first to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.


*