It was a glorious autumn day in Adelaide’s Botanic Park for the second day of WOMADelaide, the world’s music, arts and dance festival. Families have set up picnic rugs, whilst roving performers, Born in a Taxi pranced around as zebras and kids exercised their creativity in Studio Ruby Chew‘s pop-up wonderland.
The event hosts a series of workshops and interactive events. For example, Arrested Development ran a high-energy workshop creating an impromptu music-making session. Brazilian guitarist Alcides Neto bought the taste of his homeland to the Taste the World workshop. One of the Planet Talks workshops discussed our relationships with the river system. Stan’s Cafe workshop converts human population statistics into grains of rice to understand the impact of human numbers in the world. Italian artist Jovanotti had an “artist in conversation” talk amongst the Moreton Bay trees.
As day turns into night, Yothu Yindi have a giant communal sing-a-long as “Treaty” blasts from the Foundation stage speakers. Following their set, Malyangapa and Barkindji rapper BARKAA dominated stage 3. A proud first nations woman from NSW, her songs recognise the issues impacting first nations people. Her powerful performance drew a massive crowd of all ages. She has grown as an artist since appearing last at WOMAD some five years ago and gave messages of hope and growth the many young people in the audience.
Over at the Moreton Bay Stage, Daughters of Donbas gave a soulful, sad, yet uplifting performance, entitled “Songs of Stolen Children”. This project exists to highlight the plight of some 20,000 children abducted from Ukraine and taken to Russia. Singer and human rights advocate, Marichka has an incredibly emotional voice, amplified by her string quartet backing band. A particularly moving song told the story of a child taken away, the father finding his son again some seven years later. A sombre message filled with glimpses of hope.
The drawcard for the evening was clearly Grace Jones as the swelling crowd jostled for position in front of the Foundation stage. A black screen shielding the view on stage increased the tension in the crowd. Suddenly the screen drops with the queen herself perched upon an elevated white throne. Holding court behind the musicians, she was adorned with dark glasses, a suit and an extravagant headpiece. A cover of Iggy Pop’s “Nightclubbing” set the tone for the spectacle that was to follow.
Prancing and pouting, she explained that she had eaten two dozen South Australian oysters, drunk some wine and was ready to party. In her imitable style, she pouted, leered, danced, and teased the adoring audience. With a series of outlandish costume changes and songs including “Warm Leatherette”, “I’ve Seen That Face Before” and “Love Is The Drug”, it was hit after hit. There was hula dancing, crowdsurfing and more.
As if that wasn’t enough, DJ Motez held court at stage 7 near the exits with a banging set of dance tunes that had people stopping to dance their night away.
Check out a few snippets of the evening’s music selection from John Goodridge
For the past 33 years, thousands of music lovers have visited WOMADelaide to listen, dance and discover, and create a much-loved sense of community.
The event runs from 6 – 9 March 2026 at Botanic Park / Tainmuntilla, Adelaide
Tickets and more information on the website
