A few ears pricked up when the groups onstage started remixing Bach. By the time a sax cut into a prelude in C Minor, people had stopped their conversations to see where one composer ended and the other began. When a web of strings appeared under “Guantanamera,” hands found their way to other hands and started to swing.
Saturday night, St. Luke’s Steel Band, Cuban sensation Tiempo Libre and the New Haven Symphony Orchestra closed out the 24th annual International Festival of Arts & Ideas on the New Haven Green, drawing thousands as they remixed canon with steel pan, propulsive Afro-Caribbean rhythms, smooth jazz and years of classical training. As centuries of diasporic sound meshed with 400 years of classical music, the collaboration got New Haven dancing before sending attendees off to wait for the 25th annual festival next June.