Bermuda is to get a neo-soul festival this year featuring some of the hottest singers in the United States which will make the Island the place to go for well-off African Americans.

That was the promise on Thursday of Karen Joyner of leading African American marketing agency Muse Cordero Chen, who will organise the three day event over Cup Match this year.

As well as the main festival - likely to be in Dockyard - there will be spin-off late night events including live performances and "poetry slams" in hotels and clubs so that the event can be enjoyed across the Island.

Another event aimed at African Americans will be a three day "golf jam" featuring top neo-soul musicians flown in from the US and golf competitions featuring leading black golfers.

Ms Joyner said neo-soul was now the most popular music in the US and the festival would be the perfect marriage between sophisticated African Americans and up-market Bermuda.

She said aspirational African Americans will be saying "everyone can't go to Bermuda but I want to go" for the neo-soul festival. Neo-soul is the hottest music in the US and we decided to marry the sophistication of the soul music with Bermuda.

"It will be an opportunity for African Americans to get to know Bermuda and the cricket and to bring the music they like. It is so exciting, sophisticated and fun, and its going to appeal to the affluent African America travel market.

"We are looking at acts that are very popular in the African American marketplace. It will be specially designed for Bermuda and will excite everyone. It is new, its creative, its sophisticated, its upscale - it is everything Bermuda is about. The project is so perfect for Bermuda."Neo-soul is a phenomenon of roots music which has evolved from artist such as Al Green, Marvin Gaye and Gil Scott to Alicia Keys, Angie Stone and Bilal.

Ms Joyner said the African American annual travel spend was $1 billion and the target audience will be college educated blacks aged 27-35 with an income of at least $40,000. It will be targeted at city dwellers in New York, Philadelphia, Boston, Washington, and Atlanta.