June 21, 2006
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It's the summer solstice; seems like there are dozens of music festivals around the country getting underway.  The great  Aspen Music Festival opens today, with a focus this year on (surprise!) Mozart and Shostakovich.

Today's also World Music Day -- but if you knew that already, you probably call it "La Fête de la Musique." It's a quasi-diplomatic concoction of the Government of France, dreamed up in the early 1980's by culture commisar and government hipster Jack Lang.  But it's grown from a few concerts in Paris to a major international music event, with concerts in more than a hundred countries around the world -- largely sponsored by France's embassies and diplomatic missions.

"The musicians are asked to perform for free, and all the concerts are free [to] the public," says the Fête's official website.  "It’s the reason why they are used to play in open air areas as streets and parks or in public buildings like museums, train stations, castles… Furthermore, the Fête de la Musique is a way to encourage the major music institutions ... to perform outside their usual locations."

La Fete de la Musique in China

OK -- so let's go!  Slight problem -- in spite of the fact that there are hundreds of Fête concerts in places ranging from Rangoon -- yeah, Rangoon -- to Madagascar, there's only one single event in the entire United States:  the Refugee All Stars of Sierra Leone, playing tonight in Miami and sharing the stage with the French pop group Kid, the Colombian Grupo Naidy and a band playing traditional Haitian music.

So we've been snubbed by France -- ow.  But the whole concept of musical diplomacy needs to be kicked around a little more at the State Department.  Enough of those dreary little consular libraries with their earnest shelves of Thomas Paine -- music's an infinitely more effective way to get into people's ears.  I mean, who ever danced to "Common Sense"?   Karen Hughes -- take note!