(Front row from right) Asif, Letitia and Gracie (sixth right) with the performers of the 3rd MCMF.
MIRI: The sole country music festival in Asia – the 3rd Miri Country Music Festival (MCMF) that rocked Miri City last Saturday – has established itself as an important platform to promote country music internationally.
Although only at its infancy stage, being the third edition this year, it continues to attract fans and country music bands besides bringing other spinoff benefits.
A total of 2,740 local and foreign fans came on Feb 28 to the festival, 240 more than 2,500 recorded last year, while 1,700 fans came for the inaugural festival in 2014.
MCMF advisor Gracie Geikie said revenue generated this year was estimated at RM2.1 million and she thanked all for making the event a success. Among those instrumental in the success was festival artistic director Asif Ben Pishori – a multi-talented London-born international jazz pianist at The Klagan Regency in Kota Kinabalu.
“My selection process for an artistic director very much lies in the experience and aptitude not only in the knowledge of music but very much in event arrangements, people management and most importantly the right attitude.
“Our business is in conference events and festivals and every festival requires a different set of framework fundamentals and people to deal with. Asif has a great personality, is a very good musician and composer, amazing singer and teaches music. What more can I ask for,” said Gracie.
thesundaypost recently interviewed artistic director Asif Ben Pishori on MCMF’s development and its prospects in promoting Miri and country music bands from Asia to other parts of the world, particularly in the western world.
Development and response towards MCMF Asif said the response from bands had been overwhelming although initially it was a very challenging task.
“The first year was not easy as I had zero list of bands to select from. I had to reach out to my international network of musicians in Asia, Europe, UK, USA and around the world.
“But after three years of MCMF, the network of country bands has grown tremendously. Thus, I can focus on who are the best groups to perform for MCMF 2017 and beyond,” he said.
Currently, he said there are already around 30 bands keen to perform.
“It seems that every band that came to MCMF since 2014 wants to come back – they love the festival, they are so thrilled and feel proud to have been invited to participate in this festival. We have created a family of MCMF musicians, bands, performers and artistes,
“In 2014, we had eight bands performing, seven in 2015 and another seven this year and they were selected among 57 submissions. Every year, the most popular band of the previous festival will be invited to perform again. To meet popular demand, next year the festival will be held for two days and14 bands will be performing.”
Main challenges in selecting the bands
Among the main challenges are deciding which bands will create an impact at MCMF and cost factor (flights, performance fees and accommodation), as it can be very costly for those from Europe and USA and the selection committee is looking more at Australia and Asia.
“I feel this year’s MCMF, the greatest impact was with Tantowi Yahya – he has so many fans in Malaysia and his performance was the highest attended. It takes a good solid 8-to-9 months of planning and preparation and I plan to have selected all the groups performing for 2017 by June/July 2016. Thus, bands wanting to be auditioned can e-mail me before on or June at [email protected],” said Asif.
How he perceives his role as AD in the success of MCMF?
For all bands, first point of contact is the artistic director and thus has key impact when he first selects the performers and prepare the concert programme, previews and workshops as well as provide all the promotional material to be used for publicity, work together with sound providers and sub committees as well as volunteers and liaison ambassadors.
“It’s an absolutely rewarding honour to be given and I only hope I can continue to achieve the best results in this role – music is my passion. It’s a real honour to be a key person in Gracie’s team and I value the teamwork and the journey,” said Asif.
He added: “My joy and satisfaction comes when I see and experience the end results. But I also enjoy the whole process from start to finish – the challenges are great also as that is the only way to grow and get better – so yeah, the challenges and seeing the end results and chipping away and overcoming obstacles.”
MCMF ambassadors and VIPS (from left) Jude, Pakar, Mary Wan, Lai, Lee, Gracie, Raggy and Mel.
Vision for MCMF
Asif’s ultimate vision for MCMF is for it to be known worldwide and recognised as the Country Music Festival of Asia and for MCMF to spread the love of country music for more music lovers.
“As a musician and music mentor myself, I would like MCMF to encourage more local and regional groups to develop a love for country music, besides seeing more local regional artistes able to cross over the platform from Asia to USA, Europe and gain recognition as Asian country music artistes.
“Right now our international bands were surprised that there is country music in Malaysia – they did not know there are country music fans here and they were really surprised – especially the USA bands – they are happy as they can reach out to a new and wider audience,” he said.
MCMF has created a family of MCMF musicians, bands, performers, artistes
All the groups and musicians that have performed at MCMF from 2014 to 2016 are now all linked though social media – through Facebook and Whatsapp groups. They have become friends, they collaborate and perform together.
“They also help to recommend new upcoming talents, share love of country music and basically a lot of sharing going on. There is a bond between us all and that has created friendships and hence the term created ‘a family of MCMF musicians’.
“The bands that have performed in previous years do attend MCMF and even if not performing, they come and support the event as well as their fellow musicians – it’s a really family feeling when we all get together at MCMF,” he said.
Asif’s other work experience
“I’m a jazz Latin boogie woogie funk blues pianist, musician, composer, producer,entertainment director, mentor and artistic and music director. Thus, constantly throughout the year I’m working on different events, music events and concerts performances.
“My career spans 30 years and have worked with various artists over the years. Among them were George Clinton and Funkadelics, Jocelyn Brown; Mazlan Hamzah and Sam of Innuendo,” he added.
Asif too has worked on other music festivals, as a performer, article contributor as well as artiste selection team for some, like for the Miri Jazz Festival and Java Jazz Festival, KK Jazz Festival, Rainforest World Music Festival (RWMF) in Kuching, Penang World Music Festival.
Meanwhile, the 3rd MCMF held at Parkcity Everly Hotel was officiated at by the Assistant Minister of Communications Datuk Lee Kim Shin while among those present was Miri Mayor Lawrence Lai.
The MCMF 2016 featured 2Country4Nashville (Nashville USA), Ruby Boots (Australia), Leonard and the Country Riders (Singapore), Tantowi Yahya (Indonesia), OS Pombos (Kuala Lumpur), Jonathan Tse (Kota Kinabalu) and Miri’s very own country band – The Mountain Wind Band.
The annual festival was organised by Planet Conventions and Events Sdn Bhd and endorsed by Miri City Council and supported by ParkCity Everly Hotel Miri, Sarawak Tourism Board, and music portal Rentak Sejuta and Selibriti On Line.
Mountain Wind Band – the festival’s curtain-raiser.