Reviving Haiti Through Its Music*

Cristophe Colomb fut le premier à découvrir Haïti en 1492, un évènement qui devait transformer la région en une économie esclavagiste basée sur le commerce lucrative de la canne à sucre et autres produits agricoles. Au 17ème siècle, Haïti, la Martinique et la Guadeloupe étaient déjà devenues des colonies françaises. Haïti parvint à l’indépendence en 1804 suite à la révolte des esclaves, qui fut d’ailleurs la seule couronnée de succès de toute l’histoire.


La quasi totalité des genres musicaux venant d’ Haïti, de Martinique et de Guadeloupe est basée sur des rythmes traditionnels africains. Le compass Haïtien est un rythme medio tempo vraiment captivant et rempli de quiproquos à connotation sexuelle dont le saxophonist Jean Baptiste Nemours fut l’un des précurseurs. Sur le plan musical, ce style s’inspire directement de rythmes aussi variés que la merengue dominicaine, le calypso de l’ile de la Trinité, le jazz, le swing et plus récement le hip hop américain. Dès les années 60-70, le compass haïtien était également devenu le style de musique le plus populaire en Martinique et en Guadeloupe.


Michel Martelly, plus connu sous le nom de “Sweet Micky” a grandi à Carrefour, une banlieue de Port-Au-Prince, avec son frère et ses quatre souers. Son charme charimastique et sa voix brûlante ont propulsé Sweet Micky au firmament de la scène musicale compass haïtienne. Allors qu’il attribute son inspiration à des artistes comme Tabou Combo, Skah Shah et la légende du Cap Vert Cesária Évora. Micky a crée son propre son en alliant le compass avec quelques touches de reggae, de jazz, de soca et même de rara haïtienne (genre musical inspiré d’un festival folklorique haïtien).


[Pa Manyen Fanm Nan - Michel Martelly]

“Pa Manyen Fanm Nan” a été enregistré dans le cadre du très acclamé projet Haïti Twoubadou. La musique de cette chanson, rendue célèbre dans le monde entier par Cesária Évora, reprend l’hymne de Ramiro Mendes.


[Angola - Cesária Évora]

The enthralling style of music known as twoubadou dates back to the turn of the 20th century, when Haïtian migrant workers, returning from Cuban sugar plantations, brought this guitar-driven genre back with them. The Haïti Twoubadou project’s producers Fabrice Rouzier and Clement Belizaire put together a lineup that reads like an all-star list of the contemporary Haitian music scene. It features Michel Martelly, Les Freres Dodo, James Germain, Fabrice Rouzier, Michael Benjamin, Ralph Papillion, Hans Peters, Black Alex, Don Kato, Jackito, Beethova Obas and many others. These troubadours have also used the spotlight that the project has generated to help raise awareness for a variety of social problems in Haïti, including support for better education and the fight against AIDS.
Haïti Twoubadou has become such a success that the series has now extended to four volumes. This romantic sound that evokes Haïti’s windswept beaches is now being imitated in countless new twoubadou recordings, and has sparked a revival of acoustic music in the Haïtian diaspora.


[Ki Demon Sa-a - Haïti Twoubadou]


Emeline Michel was born in Gonaives, Haiti. She began singing gospel music in her local church. After studying music professionally at the Detroit Jazz Center; Michel returned to Haiti, where she released the first of her seven CDs, and was subsequently dubbed, “The Queen of Haitian Song.” Michel has made a name for herself through both her consciously aware songwriting and captivating performances. Her music combines traditional Haitian melodies with a plethora of sounds including compass, twoubadou, rara, jazz, rock, blues, bossa nova and samba.
“Moso Manman” is from Michel’s album Cordes et Ame (Strings and Soul). It is a self-produced collection of predominantly acoustic songs centered around the theme of perseverance (many are references to the political and social struggles that Haiti has been going through). Emeline Michel wrote “Moso Manman (Strong Mama)” as an ode to mothers. The lyrics say, “Dance with me mama, come dance with me mama, because even with diamonds, I can never repay you.”


[Moso Manman - Emeline Michel]

Alex Abellard launched the cutting-edge Haitian compass band Zin while he was attending City College of New York in the late 1980s. Zin is a Haitian creole word that can be interpreted both as “extraordinary” and “gossip”, two ideas that, as the group’s founder Alex Abellard puts it, “conjure up the image of the group, something that’s amazing, perhaps gossip, but something that you certainly want to hear.”
In the late 1980s, after the Haitian dictator Duvalier was overthrown, compass experienced a revival in Haiti and in expatriot communities like Miami and Brooklyn (now, the place with the second largest Haitian population in the world after Port au Prince). “When we came to New York,” explains Abellard, “we were listening to other music such as disco and hip-hop. We wanted to create a sound that was both from our own country [Haiti] while modernizing it at the same time.”


[Kanpe Sou Yon Bit - Zin]

In the late 1990s, Carlo Vieux, Richard Cave’, and Mickael Guirand decided to leave their native Haiti to pursue musical careers in the United States. All three men had strong backgrounds in Haitian compass, having played in the past with a number of popular groups. When they united in New York City, they moved to create a dynamic new form of Haitian compass, adding touches of zouk, reggae and hip-hop. Their name is a fusion of the band members’ names: Carlo, Richard, and Mickael.
“Ayiti (Bang Bang)” is the title track from their groundbreaking debut recording. The song became an immediate smash, and helped the group win “Album of the Year” at the 2001 Haitian Music Awards. Carimi uses the song as a strong indictment on the current socio-economic situation in Haiti, comparing it to the lawlessness portrayed in comic books (The reference to “Lucky Luke” in the song comes from a Belgian comic book character) and Hollywood’s images of the wild west: “My country has turned into a cowboy movie/ Bang Bang, Lucky Luke/ My country’s not a game/ Stop playing with it.”


[Ayiti (Bang Bang) - Carimi]



Tendo comecado com uma cancao em que se podem ouvir notas de outras ilhas musicais (Cabo Verde), termino com duas que, por sua vez, revelam a influencia do Haiti na linguagem musical de outras ilhas do Caribe/Antilhas, nomeadamente a Martinica e Guadeloupe (neste caso com os Kassav - que, interessantemente, em mwangole' se traduz para, mais do que apenas mandioca, funje - e um certo Rete', ja' tocado neste blog ha' uns tempos, que tambem diz algo sobre o (re)contagio destes estilos musicais com alguma da musica feita por Angolanos, como pode ser constatado aqui). Veja-se tambem, a este proposito, embora neste caso nao se possa falar propriamente de um directo "(re)contagio", o Kanpe Sou Yon Bit dos Zin, acima, em relacao a alguma da musica de um certo Afroman...


[Man Biswenw - Jean-Luc Alger]

Jean-Luc Alger hails from Martinique and had a long and illustrious career on the Caribbean music scene. He joined his first band in 1970, Les Sympas, with which he performed Haitian style compas. After a brief stint in the military, where he was part of the army band, he embarked on a successful career as bandleader and singer for the group Lazair. One highlight of this period was his work with famed singer Edith Lefel, with whom he recorded the hit song “Ice Manman” in 1984. Since the early 1990s, Alger has been working with the band Klima, and has specialized in hard-driving zouk performed with a real horn section and rhythms that keep a close connection to the roots and folklore of the French Caribbean. Recently, Alger has been working closely with producer Ronald Rubinel, one of the most respected and inventive composers and producers in modern French Caribbean music.


[Rete' - Kassav]

The world’s leading zouk band, Kassav, began with the inspiration of three men from Guadeloupe: brothers Pierre-Edouard and Georges Decimus and Jacob Desvarieux. They used the latest studio technology from Paris and created a new sound by fusing salsa, compass, reggae and other Caribbean styles with the folk rhythms of Martinique and Guadeloupe. “Before we got started”, explains Desvarieux, “the scene here in the French Antilles was dominated by Haitian compass. We wanted to create something new.”
Their name comes from the popular Caribbean dish, cassava (a mix of manioc paste and coconut). The band took shape with some of the leading musicians and vocalists from Guadeloupe and Martinique such as Jocelyn Beroard, Ralph Thamar and Jean-Phillipe Marthely. They quickly became one of the most successful bands both in France and the Caribbean, recording over a dozen hit albums, and inventing a genre.
By the mid-1980s, the group was selling out stadiums around the world with tours that spanned six continents. Kassav’s live version of the Jean-Philippe Marthely composition “Rete” is from their legendary 1986 concert at the Zenith in Paris.





*{In response to the devastating earthquake in Haiti, Putumayo Records is re-releasing their French Caribbean CD (first released in 2003 and on which this post is based) and donating 100% of the proceeds from the sale of each CD to The Red Cross, throughout 2010. Five of the (10) songs on the collection are by Haitian musicians.}

[Related Posts]

Cristophe Colomb fut le premier à découvrir Haïti en 1492, un évènement qui devait transformer la région en une économie esclavagiste basée sur le commerce lucrative de la canne à sucre et autres produits agricoles. Au 17ème siècle, Haïti, la Martinique et la Guadeloupe étaient déjà devenues des colonies françaises. Haïti parvint à l’indépendence en 1804 suite à la révolte des esclaves, qui fut d’ailleurs la seule couronnée de succès de toute l’histoire.


La quasi totalité des genres musicaux venant d’ Haïti, de Martinique et de Guadeloupe est basée sur des rythmes traditionnels africains. Le compass Haïtien est un rythme medio tempo vraiment captivant et rempli de quiproquos à connotation sexuelle dont le saxophonist Jean Baptiste Nemours fut l’un des précurseurs. Sur le plan musical, ce style s’inspire directement de rythmes aussi variés que la merengue dominicaine, le calypso de l’ile de la Trinité, le jazz, le swing et plus récement le hip hop américain. Dès les années 60-70, le compass haïtien était également devenu le style de musique le plus populaire en Martinique et en Guadeloupe.


Michel Martelly, plus connu sous le nom de “Sweet Micky” a grandi à Carrefour, une banlieue de Port-Au-Prince, avec son frère et ses quatre souers. Son charme charimastique et sa voix brûlante ont propulsé Sweet Micky au firmament de la scène musicale compass haïtienne. Allors qu’il attribute son inspiration à des artistes comme Tabou Combo, Skah Shah et la légende du Cap Vert Cesária Évora. Micky a crée son propre son en alliant le compass avec quelques touches de reggae, de jazz, de soca et même de rara haïtienne (genre musical inspiré d’un festival folklorique haïtien).


[Pa Manyen Fanm Nan - Michel Martelly]

“Pa Manyen Fanm Nan” a été enregistré dans le cadre du très acclamé projet Haïti Twoubadou. La musique de cette chanson, rendue célèbre dans le monde entier par Cesária Évora, reprend l’hymne de Ramiro Mendes.


[Angola - Cesária Évora]

The enthralling style of music known as twoubadou dates back to the turn of the 20th century, when Haïtian migrant workers, returning from Cuban sugar plantations, brought this guitar-driven genre back with them. The Haïti Twoubadou project’s producers Fabrice Rouzier and Clement Belizaire put together a lineup that reads like an all-star list of the contemporary Haitian music scene. It features Michel Martelly, Les Freres Dodo, James Germain, Fabrice Rouzier, Michael Benjamin, Ralph Papillion, Hans Peters, Black Alex, Don Kato, Jackito, Beethova Obas and many others. These troubadours have also used the spotlight that the project has generated to help raise awareness for a variety of social problems in Haïti, including support for better education and the fight against AIDS.
Haïti Twoubadou has become such a success that the series has now extended to four volumes. This romantic sound that evokes Haïti’s windswept beaches is now being imitated in countless new twoubadou recordings, and has sparked a revival of acoustic music in the Haïtian diaspora.


[Ki Demon Sa-a - Haïti Twoubadou]


Emeline Michel was born in Gonaives, Haiti. She began singing gospel music in her local church. After studying music professionally at the Detroit Jazz Center; Michel returned to Haiti, where she released the first of her seven CDs, and was subsequently dubbed, “The Queen of Haitian Song.” Michel has made a name for herself through both her consciously aware songwriting and captivating performances. Her music combines traditional Haitian melodies with a plethora of sounds including compass, twoubadou, rara, jazz, rock, blues, bossa nova and samba.
“Moso Manman” is from Michel’s album Cordes et Ame (Strings and Soul). It is a self-produced collection of predominantly acoustic songs centered around the theme of perseverance (many are references to the political and social struggles that Haiti has been going through). Emeline Michel wrote “Moso Manman (Strong Mama)” as an ode to mothers. The lyrics say, “Dance with me mama, come dance with me mama, because even with diamonds, I can never repay you.”


[Moso Manman - Emeline Michel]

Alex Abellard launched the cutting-edge Haitian compass band Zin while he was attending City College of New York in the late 1980s. Zin is a Haitian creole word that can be interpreted both as “extraordinary” and “gossip”, two ideas that, as the group’s founder Alex Abellard puts it, “conjure up the image of the group, something that’s amazing, perhaps gossip, but something that you certainly want to hear.”
In the late 1980s, after the Haitian dictator Duvalier was overthrown, compass experienced a revival in Haiti and in expatriot communities like Miami and Brooklyn (now, the place with the second largest Haitian population in the world after Port au Prince). “When we came to New York,” explains Abellard, “we were listening to other music such as disco and hip-hop. We wanted to create a sound that was both from our own country [Haiti] while modernizing it at the same time.”


[Kanpe Sou Yon Bit - Zin]

In the late 1990s, Carlo Vieux, Richard Cave’, and Mickael Guirand decided to leave their native Haiti to pursue musical careers in the United States. All three men had strong backgrounds in Haitian compass, having played in the past with a number of popular groups. When they united in New York City, they moved to create a dynamic new form of Haitian compass, adding touches of zouk, reggae and hip-hop. Their name is a fusion of the band members’ names: Carlo, Richard, and Mickael.
“Ayiti (Bang Bang)” is the title track from their groundbreaking debut recording. The song became an immediate smash, and helped the group win “Album of the Year” at the 2001 Haitian Music Awards. Carimi uses the song as a strong indictment on the current socio-economic situation in Haiti, comparing it to the lawlessness portrayed in comic books (The reference to “Lucky Luke” in the song comes from a Belgian comic book character) and Hollywood’s images of the wild west: “My country has turned into a cowboy movie/ Bang Bang, Lucky Luke/ My country’s not a game/ Stop playing with it.”


[Ayiti (Bang Bang) - Carimi]



Tendo comecado com uma cancao em que se podem ouvir notas de outras ilhas musicais (Cabo Verde), termino com duas que, por sua vez, revelam a influencia do Haiti na linguagem musical de outras ilhas do Caribe/Antilhas, nomeadamente a Martinica e Guadeloupe (neste caso com os Kassav - que, interessantemente, em mwangole' se traduz para, mais do que apenas mandioca, funje - e um certo Rete', ja' tocado neste blog ha' uns tempos, que tambem diz algo sobre o (re)contagio destes estilos musicais com alguma da musica feita por Angolanos, como pode ser constatado aqui). Veja-se tambem, a este proposito, embora neste caso nao se possa falar propriamente de um directo "(re)contagio", o Kanpe Sou Yon Bit dos Zin, acima, em relacao a alguma da musica de um certo Afroman...


[Man Biswenw - Jean-Luc Alger]

Jean-Luc Alger hails from Martinique and had a long and illustrious career on the Caribbean music scene. He joined his first band in 1970, Les Sympas, with which he performed Haitian style compas. After a brief stint in the military, where he was part of the army band, he embarked on a successful career as bandleader and singer for the group Lazair. One highlight of this period was his work with famed singer Edith Lefel, with whom he recorded the hit song “Ice Manman” in 1984. Since the early 1990s, Alger has been working with the band Klima, and has specialized in hard-driving zouk performed with a real horn section and rhythms that keep a close connection to the roots and folklore of the French Caribbean. Recently, Alger has been working closely with producer Ronald Rubinel, one of the most respected and inventive composers and producers in modern French Caribbean music.


[Rete' - Kassav]

The world’s leading zouk band, Kassav, began with the inspiration of three men from Guadeloupe: brothers Pierre-Edouard and Georges Decimus and Jacob Desvarieux. They used the latest studio technology from Paris and created a new sound by fusing salsa, compass, reggae and other Caribbean styles with the folk rhythms of Martinique and Guadeloupe. “Before we got started”, explains Desvarieux, “the scene here in the French Antilles was dominated by Haitian compass. We wanted to create something new.”
Their name comes from the popular Caribbean dish, cassava (a mix of manioc paste and coconut). The band took shape with some of the leading musicians and vocalists from Guadeloupe and Martinique such as Jocelyn Beroard, Ralph Thamar and Jean-Phillipe Marthely. They quickly became one of the most successful bands both in France and the Caribbean, recording over a dozen hit albums, and inventing a genre.
By the mid-1980s, the group was selling out stadiums around the world with tours that spanned six continents. Kassav’s live version of the Jean-Philippe Marthely composition “Rete” is from their legendary 1986 concert at the Zenith in Paris.





*{In response to the devastating earthquake in Haiti, Putumayo Records is re-releasing their French Caribbean CD (first released in 2003 and on which this post is based) and donating 100% of the proceeds from the sale of each CD to The Red Cross, throughout 2010. Five of the (10) songs on the collection are by Haitian musicians.}

[Related Posts]