In Harmony Music Festival

Tropical Fiesta

Date Sunday, May 21

6:30 p.m.

Venue Camp Alexandra

2916 McBride Ave.

Tickets $15 (includes BBQ)

North Bluff Music, 1645 140 St, 604-538-0074

A musical couple with strong Peninsula roots returns and, in return for exceptional entertainment, are soliciting help.

Latin American fusion musicians Pancho and Sal, well-known from frequent appearances at In Harmony Music Festival, headline Tropical Fiesta tomorrow (May 21) at Camp Alexandra, bringing together danceable music suitable for a spring evening.

But there’s a pressing reason for this appearance: proceeds will help pay for a bone marrow transplant for their daughter.

Ja Pace, 20, is a painter and artisan, and a bright light of the Vancouver salsa and flamenco dance scene.

But she’s been suffering from a genetic blood disorder, diagnosed when she was five, that could cut short her life.

Beta thalassemia, common in young people in the Far East or of Mediterranean descent, is characterized by an over-accumulation of iron in the blood.

The build-up of iron can damage organs and disfigure the body and – until recently – those with the condition had a life expectancy of 40 years.

Pace needs once-a-month blood transfusions and also carries an instrument that slowly releases a counter-active drug into her blood stream. The only cure recognized in Canada is a bone-marrow transplant.

That worked for her brother Vas, 18, when he was four years old because their youngest brother Lo, 15, was a perfect match.

Unfortunately no match has been found for Pace.

Time is running low. Unless she has an operation soon she will be too old.

News of success with partial match transplants at a clinic in Rome gave Pace and her family renewed hope – but hope comes with a cost: $200,000, including a $70,000 fee up-front. Because B.C. doctors don’t have enough information to recommend the procedure, the family can’t get government aid.

So far, Pancho and Sal have raised half of what they need to get Pace to Rome. Local contacts with In Harmony Festival have rallied around, and Sunday’s fiesta promises to be an all-star event.

In addition to singer/guitarist Pancho and singer/percussionist Sal and their back-up group (Loca Banda), the line-up includes horn and percussion combo The Carnival Band, rock and blues with The Unusual Suspects and Louisiana dance music by Zydeco Experience.

Pancho, from Argentina, and Sal (who has Argentine roots, although she was born in Bristol, England) met in a marketplace in Peru 22 years ago. They have toured extensively in Europe and North America.

But they’ve retained a soft spot for Crescent Beach.

“Our roots with Camp Alexandra start when Ja was three years old,” Pancho said.

“We had a motor home we would park outside Camp Alexandra every Thursday night when we would play at the coffee house.”

“People out there go out of their way for us,” Sal said.