UNC Wilmington's Lumina Festival returns with world-class reggae, comedy, music

After missing two years due to the pandemic, the University of North Carolina Wilmington's sprawling, multi-disciplinary Lumina Festival of the Arts is back — and with a distinctive island flair. 

Between Wednesday, March 16, and Tuesday, March 29, the festival will host 20 events, many of them with world-class touring acts from the realms of popular music (Steel Pulse on March 19, Trampled by Turtles on March 22), comedy (The Second City on March 17), classical and jazz (Wayne Wallace, March 25). Reflecting the theme of this year's festival, nearly a third of the events at Lumina will feature reggae music, which of course began in Jamaica and has become a worldwide phenomenon. 

Essentially, the 2022 festival has gone all-in on "Reggae Redemption Rising," the slogan being used to promote Lumina this year. So, who better to be the co-organizer and public face of Lumina than the woman whose name has been synonymous with reggae in Wilmington for more than 25 years?

Kimberly McLaughlin-Smith has been UNCW’s Institutional Diversity and Inclusion Specialist since 2008. But she's better known locally as "The Night Nurse," a promoter of and advocate for reggae who's been on Wilmington's cultural scene since she moved to town in 1993. 

She said this year's Lumina Festival is the "biggest thing that's happened for reggae in Wilmington," even as the genre has long had a local foothold, even as far back as the 1980s when reggae bands were playing the legendary Mad Monk music venue — shows McLaughlin-Smith often traveled to Wilmington to attend.

Past coverage:25 years ago The Mad Monk, one of Wilmington's most iconic venues, closed for good

"I see it as a vote of confidence in the community," she said of the festival's reggae-heavy vibe this year. 

Not long after she arrived in Wilmington, public radio station WHQR gave The Night Nurse a reggae show. McLaughlin-Smith has been on the local airwaves ever since, bouncing between a few stations. She's currently on modern rock station 98.7 FM, where her "Reggae Redemption with The Night Nurse" show airs 10 p.m.-midnight every Sunday.

Finding a Wilmington spotlight for reggae has been, in some ways, McLaughlin-Smith's life's work. A native of Raleigh, the music of the islands has always stirred something in her. 

"I wasn't born to it," she said. "It was born in me."

For years now she's dreamed of having some kind of reggae festival in Wilmington, and she credits Rhonda Bellamy, director of the Arts Council of Wilmington and New Hanover County, with putting a bug in the ear of Fidias Reyes, director of arts engagement with UNCW's Office of the Arts and a co-organizer of Lumina. 

Under the leadership of Jeanine Mingé, executive director of UNCW's Office of the Arts, McLaughlin-Smith booked most of the music for Lumina while Reyes mostly concentrated on the non-musical, performing arts portion of the festival. 

Once she got buy-in from Reyes, McLaughlin-Smith said, she immediately reached out to David Hinds, who co-founded the legendary Steel Pulse band in Birmingham, England, in the 1970s. They went on to become the first non-Jamaican act to win the Grammy Award for Best Reggae Album.

"He was at the top of my list," McLaughlin-Smith said, and Steel Pulse headlines Kenan on Saturday. "But I wanted to have all facets."

To showcase the regional and stylistic variety of reggae, McLaughlin-Smith got California reggae act Iya Terra to open the Lumina Festival on Wednesday with longtime Wilmington reggae act Steve Martinez & The Give Thanks Band.

On Friday, March 18, it's Washington D.C.'s Ras Lidj Regg'Go band, which combines the roots and dancehall styles of reggae with the "go-go" subgenre of funk that originated in D.C. in the 1970s. It's a style that lends itself to the call-and-response traditions that trace their roots back to Africa, and it was a "no brainer," McLaughlin-Smith said, to pair Ras Lidj Regg'Go on the bill with a poetry slam hosted by radio DJs Brandon "Bigg B" Hickman and Sandra "The Midday Miss" of Coast 97.3 FM, who've been staging poetry jams locally for years. 

On March 25, Ric Williams of the reggae band Mystic Vibrations (opening for Steel Pulse on March 19) will play jazz and reggae with UNCW student musicians in Beckwith Recital Hall. Also on March 25, Wilmington artist Cammeron Batanides will open an art exhibit she curated, "Reggae Redemption Rising: We Are One Exhibit," at the arts council's ACES Gallery downtown for Fourth Friday Gallery Nights. 

The reggae portion of Lumina Festival will culminate March 26 with a "reggae ball" at Ironclad Brewery downtown featuring music by South Florida's Artikal Sound System (who recently sued Dua Lipa for copyright infringement, btw) and Greensboro's Pure Fiyah.

"Why not dress to the nines, celebrate the music in a different way," McLaughlin-Smith asked, adding that she wants people to know "how carefully we curated the talent" for Lumina Festival. 

"This music is rooted in suffering and triumph," she said. "I want to celebrate the lives of these artists."

Lumina Festival highlights

The Lumina Festival of the Arts, started by former UNCW Arts director Kristen Brogdon in 2017, was originally inspired by Charleston's Spoleto Festival and envisioned as a way to get people on UNCW's campus during the summer months.

Moving the festival to the spring this year has allowed students to be a bigger part of Lumina, McLaughlin-Smith said, even as much of the original concept — performances in theater, dance and multiple genres of music, as well as visual art events that promote community engagement — remains. 

Even without the reggae component, this year's festival is nothing if not diverse. A few highlights: 

On St. Patrick's Day, one of the country's leading improv troupes, The Second City, performs at Kenan Auditorium. 

On March 20, Nashville singer-songwriter Katy Pruitt, who has appeared on NPR's popular "Tiny Desk Concert" series, plays Kenan, followed by a return to Wilmington by folk/bluegrass icons Trampled by Turtles on March 22. 

On March 23, a documentary, "Los Hermanos (The Brothers)," about Cuban virtuosos (and brothers) Ilmar and Aldo López-Gavilán's blend of jazz and classical, piano and violin, will screen at Lumina Theatre.

Three-time Grammy-nominated jazz trombonist Wayne Wallace plays Kenan on March 25. And on March 27, Lumina Fest will give a very special send-off to Paula Haller, founder of Wilmington's DocuTime documentary film festival. After two decades, Haller, who has been in ill health, is putting the festival to bed with a screening of the film "Julia" about renowned chef Julia Child. 

Read more:Under the leadership of the tireless Paula Haller, DocuTime thrives

Lumina Fest will come to an end on March 29 with a performance by Tre Cotten's Human Mortals Project. 

Cotten is a professional actor and voice/speech instructor who lives in Vancouver, British Columbia. He graduated from UNCW's theater program in 2013 and was a regular performer on the Wilmington boards, for Opera House Theatre Co. and other companies, during his time in Wilmington. 

Inspired by a quote from Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" — "The human mortals want their winter cheer" — the devised project starts with Shakespearean text but expands to include the experiences of performers, both UNCW students and community members. 

Cotten said he's trying to find a way to bring Shakespearean ideas and themes into the modern day by making them accessible, especially to a diverse audience. 

"This is the community that helped water me," Cotten said. "I always want to give back to the community. Wilmington is a huge part of me. Coming back here is all about sharing the knowledge."

Want to go?

What: Lumina Festival of the Arts, presented by the UNCW Office of the Arts

When: March 16-29

Where: Most events are on the UNCW campus. Venues include Kenan Auditorium, SRO Theatre, CAB Gallery, UNCW Amphitheater and Lumina Theatre.

Info: Tickets are sold separately to individual events; all ticketed events are $5 for students. Some events are free (see below). 

Details: 910-962-3500 or UNCW.edu/Arts

Schedule

• March 16: Iya Terra with Steve Martinez & The Give Thanks Band (reggae, Kenan Auditorium, $40)
• March 17: The Second City (improv comedy at Kenan Auditorium, $25-$35)
• March 17-19: Three one-act plays by David Ives (SRO Theatre, $10) 
• March 18: Protest signs exhibition (CAB Gallery, free)
• March 18: Ras Lidj Regg'Go Band, with spoken word poetry hosted by Bigg B and The Mid Day Miss (Kenan Auditorium, $30)
• March 19: Creative play pop-up with Turning the Wheel Dance (St. James Episcopal Parish, free)
• March 19: Steel Pulse, Mystic Vibrations (reggae, Kenan Auditorium, $45)
• March 19: Salsa Party with Wilmington Latin Dance (UNCW Amphitheatre, free)
• March 20: Katie Pruitt (singer-songwriter, Kenan Auditorium, $35)
• March 22: Trampled by Turtles (bluegrass and folk, Kenan Auditorium, $45-$65)
• March 23: Los Hermanos/The Brothers (documentary film, classical, jazz, Lumina Theatre, free)
• March 24: UNCW Symphonic Band, with Nois (classical, Kenan Auditorium, $10)
• March 25: Ric Williams with UNCW Student Combo (reggae, jazz, Beckwith Recital Hall, free)
• March 25: "Reggae Redemption Rising: We Are One Exhibit" (ACES Gallery in downtown Wilmington, free)
• March 25: Wayne Wallace (jazz, Kenan Auditorium, $10)
• March 26: Wilmington School of Rock House Band and the Wilmington Symphony "Rockestra" (Kenan Auditorium, $10)
•  March 26: Reggae Ball, with Artikal Sound System with Pure Fiyah (Ironclad Brewery downtown, $45)
•  March 27: DocuTime screening of "Julia" and salute to Paula Haller (Kenan Auditorium, $10)
• March 29: UNCW AIDS Art and Science Showcase (Kenan Auditorium, free)
• March 29: Tré Cotten's Human Mortals Project (Kenan Auditorium, free)

Contact John Staton at 910-343-2343 or John.Staton@StarNewsOnline.com.