AFRICAN culture through music, performance, visual art and film is the artistic focus for this year's festival, culminating in the final peace weekend and the arrival of Nobel Peace Laureate, Archbishop Desmond Tutu to the city.
Highlights include Zulu dancers, the Lions of Zululand, who will be performing traditional dances, songs and poetry dating back to the Zulu empire led by the founder of the Zulu nation, King Shaka, at Stonehenge and Danebury Hillfort.
Kora virtuoso N'Faly Koyaté (pictured on front cover) draws inspiration from jazz and West African storytelling. And from the hot sands of the Southern Sahara, guitar band Tinariwen make their debut in the city.
Leslie Lewis Sword brings her one-woman drama, Miracle in Rwanda, to Salisbury. Depicting the true story of genocide survivor Immaculée Ilibagiza, this is in incredibly moving play, with an uplifting message of forgiveness and compassion.
Cape Dance Company will perform their exciting show, Cicadas, inspired by the incessant rasping chatter of the insects who fill the Karoo's midday heat, depicting the landscape through imagery, movement and insect-like themes. The company will also perform a newly created work for the festival.
The Peace Weekend opens with a performance by the Rainbow Choir of Karl Jenkins' The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace and is a truly international affair with children from the Fezeka school choir in the Gugulethu township in South Africa uniting with Salisbury Community Choir.
As part of the Peace Weekend, the Allegri String Quartet will perform Michael Stimpson's String Quartet No 1 (Robben Island). Michael Stimpson lives near Salisbury and will be giving a talk about his work after the concert.
And don't miss the opportunity to catch some immensely diverse cinema from the continent, from the Oscar winning Tsotsi to The Cart Driver, the first ever indigenous black African film, made in 1966.
