Forwarded from Steve Cook of Jonesborough, TN:

You're invited to share an earth-moving experience!...

Pangaea

W o r l d . M u s i c . F e s t i v a l

May 3 - 5, 2002 Jonesborough, Tennessee

For Immediate Release

A Close-Up Look At The World...Pangaea!

Students can get a closer look at the world this year as musicians from all corners of the earth make Tennessee's oldest town their temporary home this spring.

Pangaea (pan-GEE-uh) World Music Festival will make its debut May 3-5, 2002, in Jonesborough, bringing a wide variety of internationally-acclaimed musicians.

When the likes of Grammy Award-winning entertainer, Dr. Ralph Stanley (Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?) and Grammy Award 2002 nominee Trout Fishing In America (Nominee for Best Children's Album) move into town to highlight the musical line-up, the bluegrass and Americana/children's entertainment will obviously be at its best.

But that's only part of the musical menu.

Pangaea will bring sounds from as far away as China, Chile, Switzerland and Africa as part of the three-day extravaganza. Featuring musical samples of everything from jazz to Cajun, folk to Latin rhythms and beyond, special entertainment programming will be included on Friday to accommodate school groups. Music-related workshops and a World Bazaar with ethnic food and shops will also highlight the event. Performances will be in enclosed venues called "villages".

In a way, Pangaea has been in the making for more than five years. Music On The Square (MOTS), the brainchild of local artisan, musician and businessman, Steve Cook, has drawn hundreds of music lovers downtown on warm summer Friday nights, bringing their chairs, their families and their appetites for diverse offerings of music performed in the courthouse square.

Encouraged by MOTS' success, organizer Steve Cook has now decided to take the concept even further. He says the festival will be an especially wonderful opportunity for students and their families to experience the performing arts of many different cultures.

"We are attempting to create a very educational as well as entertaining event where we hope our visitors will experience the music and cultures of faraway places which they may never have a chance to explore otherwise," said Cook.

According to Cook, the festival's rather odd name comes from an old scientific theory of continental drift. German meteorologist Alfred Wegener in 1912 theorized that about 200 million years ago, before wind, water and gravity took its effect on the world, all the continents were one huge land mass. Wegener called this "one land" Pangaea.

"We're basing this world music festival concept not only on unique entertainment," Cook said, "but on the hope that, through music, we can all learn from and enjoy the many cultures of the world, hopefully making us closer as an international society."

Tickets are now on sale, with special school group rates of $5 per student for Friday only. For more information, please call 423-753-1011, 1-800-400-4221 or go to the official festival website, pangaeafest.com.

To volunteer for the festival and receive a free weekend passport, cool t-shirt, and refreshments, please go to www.pangaeafest.com and click on "volunteer".