While Vancouver enjoys a rich level of cultural diversity, one of the city's challenges is to encourage crosscultural exchange and interaction.

The ninth City of Bhangra Festival's kick-off event, rePercussion, is prime example of how to put a philosophy of unification into practise. Held at the Fei and Milton Wong Experimental Theatre at SFU Woodward's on May 30, the event brought together percussionists, musicians, and performers from a wide range of backgrounds to perform music that spanned African, South American, and South Asian influences.

"A conversation—it's a theme that runs in all of this music," host and musician Paul Bray explained. "Except instead of using language of our voices, we're using the language of rhythm."

And what a conversation it was.

The evening began with a performance by the HSBC Bhangra Team, featuring dancers from a variety of ethnicities and cultures. The team performed in public for their first time.

The South Asian team, comprised of Karn Bhuller (dhol); Sunil Kalyan (tabla), who performed on Missy Elliott's "Get Ur Freak On"; and Curtis Andrews (mridangam), only met about an hour for the first time before performing together. Nonetheless, they enthralled the audience with their rhythmic collaboration.

Vancouver-based guitarist Celso Machado, who hails from Brazil, performed bossa nova–style songs, such as "Varal".

Tap dancer Susan Nase and Kathak classical Indian dance Amika Kushwaha delivered a particularly inspired crosscultural performance in which east and west met in a visual and auditory dialogue of dance.

Other performers included drummer and singer Israel "Toto" Berriel, timbales player Mario Allende, mbira player Kurai Mumbaiwa, and guitarist Antuan Nuñez.  

The City of Bhangra Festival continues until June 8, and features a variety of music and dance events, some of which are free. For more information, visit the festival website.