Welcome to the Mela, a vibrant, joyous riot of sounds, sights, colours and tastes in the heart of Edinburgh. We’re here to challenge your senses with Bhangra beats, delicious food, family fun, global fashion and some utterly amazing music, dance and theatre, all on one site!
What’s new at the Mela
For 2012, we’ve got a brand new director, Chris Purnell, and a brand new outlook. This year, we’re really focusing on bringing you the best international performance, world music and dance – in some cases so close you can probably touch it.
It all starts with passion, fireworks and an explosive spectacular: internationally-renowned pyrotechnical theatre company Walk the Plank, in collaboration with Edinburgh’s Dance Ihayami, help us open the Mela with their incendiary take on the story of Rama and Sita. This will be a free event on the evening of Friday 31 August – say goodbye to the summer and hello to the Mela with a bang (or eighty).
Our Mela World Dance Feste is a brand new, unique platform for international and Scottish dance (and dance lovers) within the Edinburgh Festivals, and we’re very excited to present two new commissions of our own in amongst a packed dance programme.
Don’t worry: all the things our audience love are still present and correct: our Global Food Village will still be there to tempt you with tastes and aromas from all over the world; our ever-popular fashion show is bigger than ever this year, and we’ve got some of the hottest Bhangra stars and biggest beats around on our music stages.
We’ll be launching our programme officially in June, but we’ll probably drop a few hints as to what’s coming up on our Twitter, Facebook and Youtube pages before then.
Connect with the Mela and we’ll keep you posted!
