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My life is filled with stories: stories of youthful love, broken hearts and broken men, wastrels and artists, and death. A son of the South, my life is filled with stories told by the campfire, across the dinner table, and in whispered, sonorous tones apropos of funerals. And some of those stories live on in songs.
In the 1750s the French residents were expelled (during the Le Grand Dérangement) by the English from what is now Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island in Canada. Some of those refugees eventually settled in Southwest Louisiana. They would become known as Cajuns—a local truncation of Acadian. Meanwhile, Louisiana nurtured a vibrant and growing community of people, referred to as Les Gens Libres du Couleur and fueled by the Haitian Revolt of the late 18th century, that defined a mixed culture that we now refer to as Creole. While each had their own musical styles, the following century and a half witnessed a melding of these traditions and French Music was born—sometimes referred to as La-La French and driven principally by the fiddle.
With the introduction of the accordion in the late 19th century, dancehall music infused itself into the traditional music and the old rounds and contra dances were, by the 1920s, replaced by waltzes and the scandulous two-step. Bands of mix-raced-musicians were both popular and common, despite the segregation of the audiences; and in this crucible of frenzied art was born what we now refer to as Zydeco music.
But Cajun music was always, at heart, a music of the ballad, the story, told to an African syncopated beat, of heartbreak and longing.
Last weekend, I listened to the slightly mannered Creole French of a young man who has delved deeply into this old music and managed to bring a fresh and modern sensibility to those tired tales of my youth. Cedric Watson, nominated for a Grammy not many years ago, plies his trade in that musical style described as La-La French—the old school Creole.
Cedric Watson plays a variety of old-school zydeco styles, original material, and Creole traditionals. The polyrhythmic and syncopated sounds of Africa and the Caribbean echo in his ensemble. He plays old La-La French music...in accordion, fiddle, and guitar....[H]e displays the more blues and R&B influence of Clifton Chenier, John Delafose, Canray Fontenot, Beau Jocque (Andrus Espree ) and Bebe Carrier...."More recently with Bijou Creole," he is "developing an expansive modern take on his adopted state’s already hybridized Creole sounds, flavoring it with hearty injections of soul and Caribbean influences as well as whiffs of bluegrass and string-band music—an approach that reached its fullest expression yet on Le Troubadour Creole."
He and his band, The Bijou Creole, were quite entertaining. Although I didn't get to hear him play the gourd banjo, there were plenty of accordion and fiddle tunes to enjoy. In the
Chicago Reader, is a brief riff on his music that I think is worth sharing:
San Felipe, Texas—about 50 miles west of Houston—isn't exactly a Creole hot spot. But that's where accordionist, fiddler, and singer Cedric Watson grew up, and in the past few years he's emerged as the great hope of Louisiana's black Creole culture. Youthful visits to relatives in Louisiana sparked his curiosity, and a year after finishing high school he moved to Lafayette and began learning the local French dialect. Before long he was relighting the sputtering torch once carried by the likes of Amadé Ardoin and Canray Fontenot: Watson became the key member of Pine Leaf Boys, a group of Cajun revivalists who played tradition-oriented originals and classic material, and a few years he ago he struck out on his own. On his second album, L'esprit Creole (Valcour), he gracefully ping-pongs between Cajun and zydeco, adding generous helpings of soul, blues, and Caribbean music (he plays the Hohner Erica, a diatonic button accordion that's popular in the islands) that complement rather than overwhelm the Creole flavor.
So, no stories from me this morning: just music that reminds me of those days of short pants and bony knees, melodic voices wafting from the kitchen, and the alluring smells of innocence and wonder.
Grab a cup of coffee and join us.
What's on your mind this morning?