Dec 04 - Boney M To Headline At Winter Party In Town
The Ministry of Culture will organise as part of the ‘Christmas Spectacular,’ a series of exciting events, a ‘Winter Party in Town,’ to be held at Casemates Square on Saturday 20 December. John Mackintosh Square and Chatham Counterguard will also see a number of events during the day. The main event at Casemates Square will start 13.30 and is scheduled to finish at 20.00 (approx). The event has been carefully designed to make it a family day event for all to enjoy.
This event will be headlined by internationally-renowned vocal group BONEY M, featuring original band member Maizie Williams. The group was formed in 1976 and achieved popularity during the disco era of the late 1970s. Since the 1980s, various line-ups of the band have performed with different personnel. They will perform all their well-known songs including their famous Christmas hits, ‘Mary’s Boy Child,’ ‘Brown Girl In The Ring,’ ‘Rivers of Babylon’ amongst many other hits. The group is distinguished by their unique disco, euro-disco, dance-pop and Christmas music genres and their eight studio albums with numerous No 1 chart hits. The act, in our view fits perfectly well with the Christmas season.
Local, up-coming band, THE TRIO will be supporting act for BONEY M. The band is composed of Jesse Maclaren, Jeremy Perez & Rob Bensusan and they will also play Christmas hits, in line with the family festive spirit.
The event will kick off at noon with local DJ’s playing all types of music to suit all ages. Also performing on the day will be URBAN DANCE GROUP with their ‘Christmas Extravaganza’ featuring a snowman. Santa will be dancing on stage too!
Art in Movement will also be making an appearance, directed and choreographed by Nathan Conroy. Their performance includes break dance by their kids’ section and a classical dance. A percussive show will follow including guest Nigel Palmer on vocals and visiting breakers. A STOMP-like solo by Nathan Conroy will no doubt be one of the highlights of AIM’s performance. Also in town, Santa will accompanied by his helpers, greeting and meeting everyone from 14.30, Santa will take your Christmas wish list letters and will make sure that all presents arrive on time! More information will be released soon.
More local acts featuring the Santos Production Academy & the Gibraltar Cheerleading Association National Team 2014 plus many more acts will be announced shortly! No strangers to Gibraltar, THE NEW ORLEANS JUMP BAND, will also be performing Jazz along Main Street.
Kids’ activities will also be available throughout the day, starting from 10.00hrs with characters around town taking photos with the general public. Jumping castles and face painting will also be available.
The Gibraltar Sea Scouts will play a set of Christmas carols at the Piazza assembling as from 11.45am and will march down Main Street to Casemates Square at noon. They will also play some more Christmas carols at the Square from 13:00. They will be joined by the Gibraltar Re- Enactment Association traditional Saturday march through the town.
The whole event is in aid of GBC Open Day and to raise funds for the Gibraltar Round Table. As part of this charity, the traditional Christmas Santa Pull will be organized by the Gibraltar Round Table collecting monies for the charity. This will start as from 10.00hrs from Casemates and will move up and down town and end at Casemates once again at 13.00hrs. They will be accompanied at times by THE NEW ORLEANS JUMP BAND.
The Alwani Group will donate a Laptop and the Ministry of Culture staff will organize a raffle during the day with the winner announced on stage shortly before the headline act.
This event is organised by the Ministry of Culture and is supported by the Ministry of Tourism, Commercial Affairs, Public Transport and the Port, the Gibraltar Federation of Small Businesses (GFSB) and a number of local businesses.
The Ministry of Culture would like to thank these private sponsors for supporting this event. We sincerely hope that the general public will turn up in large numbers and enjoy this Christmas family day event. Why not use this opportunity to do your last-minute Christmas shopping in town!
Steven Linares, the Minister for Culture said ‘I would like to sincerely thank everyone who has helped financially in making our “Winter Party in Town” possible. Once again Government and local businesses unite in providing quality entertainment of for the benefit of the community.’
