About World Music Central
Thank you for visiting our Web site. World Music Central is a portal dedicated to World Music. We feature the latest news, CD and concert reviews, articles, an events calendar, and resources for music fans, industry professionals and researchers. By World Music we mean traditional and contemporary folk and roots music from the entire globe, as well as cross-cultural fusions and hybrids.
Angel Romero is the founder of World Music Central. He is a world music collector, researcher and experienced producer.
Donations:
If you like what we do, and you have the resources, please help us by sending us a donation. We need your help to maintain and improve the Web site. You can contribute with cash, with your volunteer work (in-kind) or with materials.
World Music Central is looking for the following:
Cash
In kind volunteer help
Musical instruments
We are developing a musical instrument collection that will be eventually housed in a world music museum. Please send us any kind of musical instrument. We are specially interested in animal-shaped ocarinas and whistles. We ask you to let us know the origin if possible and where it was manufactured or purchased. Your name will appear with a full credit as the donor.
Equipment
Laptop computers, PC or Mac
Digital handycam or movie camera
Photo camera with zoom lens
Books and CDs
We accept world music CDs and music related books, used or new, for our future library.
If you would like to contribute as a volunteer or with materials, please contact Angel Romero, E-mail: angel at worldmusiccentral dot org . Send any material contributions to 2524 Cascadilla Street, Durham, NC 27704, USA.
Donors:
The following persons have generously contributed monetarily or in-kind to World Music Central:
Andrew Gray, Jim Mirkovic, Mark Gorney, Teresa J. Nelson-Romero, Stephen Cowles, Elizabeth Thompson, Sarah Wolfe, Ursula Nokonoko, Rita Granda, and Estela Zatania.More about the founder of World Music Central:
Angel Romero has been involved with the music business and media for many years. He has a licensure in Journalism from the University of Madrid (Universidad Complutense de Madrid).
He founded his first label, Mindchild Records, while in college, in the early 1980s. Mindchild Records released progressive rock and electronic music.
After graduation Angel worked for several newspapers and magazines until he got he was hired to work for Metrópolis, an arts program produced by TVE (Spanish Public TV). Angel produced 4 specials dedicated to creative and avant-garde music videos. Later, TVE hired as producer (his official title was coordinator) for Música NA, an eclectic TV show focusing on world music, contemporary acoustic, new age, contemporary classical, fusion jazz, and documentaries about high tech and music. The show lasted nearly three years. After TVE cancelled most of its specialized music shows, Angel worked as a freelance translator, writer, and music producer. He worked as media coordinator for the Visual Music Festival in Lanzarote (Canary Islands) for two years.
In 1993, Angel moved to the United States. After a brief stay in Nashville, he moved to Long Island, New York, to work for Ellipsis Arts. There, he worked as international sales director and producer. He produced three boxed sets: Duende (flamenco), The Big Bang (world drums and percussion), and Planet Soup (world fusion and cross cultural collaborations). Duende won the NAIRD Indie award for Best Packaging. Angel was also product manager for the Musical Expeditions series (hard cover books + CDs).
In 1996, Angel moved to Durham, North Carolina. For a while, he worked as label manager for Legato Records, a Portland (Oregon) based company devoted to electric guitar virtuosos in the fields of rock and jazz. He also worked for Music of the World (Chapel Hill), in the fields of sales, marketing and production. He remastered several recordings made by the World Music Institute.
A year later, in 1997, Angel started Alula Records, together with Japanese banjo player and producer Akira Satake. In a short period of time, Alula Records became one of the top independent world music labels in the USA. It won three AFIM Indie awards for Best Cover Design, Best Contemporary World Music Album and Best Contemporary Folk Album. Under his tenure, Alula Records released 21 CDs. The company was sold to its US distributor, Allegro Corporation, in 2002.
Since the sale of Alula Records, Angel has worked in music publishing, and as a music consultant and liner notes translator. But his greatest pride are two world music portals, the English language World Music Central (which was initially called World Music Portal) and the Spanish language Músicas del Mundo.
World Music Central
http://www.worldmusiccentral.org/staticpages/index.php/about_us