The treatment meted out to Jewish-American reggae icon Matisyahu by the organizers of Spain’s Rototom Sunsplash music festival, held annually near Valencia, is by now common knowledge. Refusing to sign on to the pro-Palestinian BDS movement making the global rounds, he was disinvited from participating in the event. As Matisyahu posted [1] on his Facebook page:
The festival kept insisting that I clarify my personal views; which felt like clear pressure to agree with the BDS political agenda. Honestly it was appalling and offensive, that as the one publicly Jewish-American artist scheduled for the festival they were trying to coerce me into political statements. Were any of the other artists scheduled to perform asked to make political statements in order to perform? No artist deserves to be put in such a situation simply to perform his or her art. Regardless of race, creed, country, cultural background, etc, my goal is to play music for all people. As musicians that is what we seek. – Blessed Love, Matis
It was only after the Spanish government and various prominent Jewish agencies intervened that Matisyahu was re-invited.
On the micro-level of public opprobrium, I recently experienced something similar. Having been invited, pro forma, with my pianist wife Janice to play a selection of my original songs at the farmers’ market held in the small southeastern Ontario town where we make our home (let’s call it Cataraqui), I lingered six weeks to learn the date of our performance. Finally, I inquired by email. After a few days, I received the following message from the event organizer:
Hi David
I’m sorry, I’ve been somewhat out of the loop and had to step back a bit from market organising, but I thought someone had been in touch. My understanding was that there was some concern that your musical style might not be the best fit for the market but I believe moreso [sic] that the strong political content of your website was not something we were prepared to appear to be endorsing.