Fashion show
To benefit Grecia Palliative Care Unit, 7 p.m., Salón El Lago, Grecia. Info: 2494-2500.

Hillsong in concert
7 p.m., Oasis de Esperanza, Moravia, 2507-9800.

9th International Baroque Music Festival
Part I, EMAI Youth Orchestra, performing works by C.P. Bach, Rameau, Haydn, Clarke, Vivaldi, Purcell; Part II, EMAI Youth Orchestra and Choir, soprano Alejandra Ulate, soprano Susana Velasco, tenor Danilo Chávez, bass Rafael Angel Saborío, performing serenade-opera by Fray Esteban Ponce de León, 7: 30 p.m., Santa Ana Church, Santa Ana, southwestern San José suburb.

Russian National Ballet
8 p.m., Melico Salazar Theater. 2207-2025, www.mundoticket.com.

The Skatalites, who arrived in Costa Rica yesterday, performed Jamaican ska – a genre they helped spawn more than 40 years ago – last night at Club Capone in San José.

“Ska is the root of the tree, reggae is one of the branches,” said keyboardist Ken Stewart, who, along with four other members, met The Tico Times at Mall San Pedro, a few hours before the show.

Stewart, from the U.S. city of Boston, is one of the ever-changing roster of prime musicians that continue to carry the Skatalites torch.

Fellow U.S. musician Kevin Batchelor, a trumpeter from St. Louis, Missouri, called the experience of playing with The Skatalites “tremendous.”

A founding member, saxophonist Lester Starling, said the key to keeping the group's vibe is to always hire “great musicians.” The band consists of nine, including a signature horn section and a rhythm section.

Indeed ska has much to do with the laidback style that singer Bob Marley poured over the world – but with a faster beat.

“Ska was before reggae, and it was faster; then they slowed it down to rocksteady, and then to reggae,” said guitarist Devon James, a Jamaican who says he has played ska for more than 20 years.

The Skatalites and their genre are famous for horn-heavy romps that drive hard on the upbeat, exemplified on the legendary song “Guns of Navarone.”

Bits of the pattern can be heard throughout Jamaica's music.

Asked if he enjoyed his island nation's current musical styles, Starling remained diplomatic. “That's DJ music,” he said. “Well, that's what the young people like, so more or less it's good for them.”

President Oscar Arias is hoping whoever wins the Nov. 4 U.S. presidential election will pay greater attention, and provide bigger aid packages, to Latin America.

“As a Latin American, one can only hope that the United States turns its eyes more to Latin America, its neighbor to the south, and not for solidarity, not for generosity, but for simple interest in having more prosperous neighbors,” Arias told reporters yesterday at a ceremony at the Inter-American Human Rights Court in San José.

Regarding the candidates, Arias said that “if we believe what all the polls are saying then Barak Obama is going to win, but it'll be the Americans that finally choose.”

Arias said he has high hopes the new U.S. administration will increase aid to this region's poorest communities.

“The government of the United States has to think about increasing its cooperation because its spending has gone principally to Asia and not Latin America,” Arias said.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) this year budgeted approximately $963 million for programs in Latin America and the Caribbean, according to its Web site. In Asia, USAID is managing $2.5 billion in U.S. assistance activities.

But the United States has not shirked its commitment, according to U.S. Ambassador Peter Cianchette.

“If you look at the relationship that we've had with Costa Rica – if you go back 50 years – you'll find that no other country has given the amount of resources, or even close to it, as the United States has,” he told The Tico Times last week.

Arias, a staunch proponent of free trade, said commerce is good, but it's not enough.

“It's necessary for the United States to channel resources to the poorest countries – I'm thinking of certain ones in Central America but also Haiti, which is the poorest in the hemisphere and has been lashed by hurricanes,” he said.

“Solidarity with Haiti is lacking in the richest country in the world,” said Arias.

Mexico's América Móvil Enitel has donated 3,000 computers to some 200 schools in Nicaragua.

“We want investors in Nicaragua with social commitment,” said President Daniel Ortega after the donation.

Ortega said that the telecom and computer giant, owned by mogul Carlos Slim, has in the past donated thousands of bicycles for students and teachers in areas that lack reliable public transportation.

The company added that in the future it plans to donate thousands of eyeglasses to children and adults to support literacy programs in the country.