Categories
Festivals Music

Bailan los parranderos!

This account of parang music, the music of the Trinidad Christmas, was posted by Shaina Lipp in Afropop Worldwide, 9th November, 2012.

Wake up n’ get out of bed! The parranderos are here to serenade us! Living in Trinidad and Tobago in the early 1970s, you may have fallen the not-so-unlucky victim of parang, a semi-seasonal activity in which groups of musicians and revelers pay festive night time visits to houses in small communities. So, break out the food or the rum and let’s dance!

Parang is one fortunate and fruitful example of the cultural transmission (and the subsequent borrowing and fusing of traditional forms) that results from this travel. The word parang is derived from two Spanish words: ‘parranda,’ meaning ‘fête, or spree’ and ‘parar,’ the verb ‘to stop.’ Traditionally, the serenaders of parang (parranderos) visit the homes of families and friends during the night to wake them from sleep; they play music, dance and sing as they go paranging throughout the town to spread good vibes and general merriment. In exchange for entertainment, parranderos are usually given food and drink: pastelle (a type of bready desert), sorrel and rum.

The earliest examples of the music are heavily influenced by joropo, a classic style of Venezuelan folk music, but quickly came to include a significant helping of Caribbean groove in the mix. Because parang takes its original influences from Afro-Venezuelan culture, we see an instrumentation that reflects this migratory origin: the cuatro, maracas, claves, box bass, bandolin, caja and the marimbola. But the parranderos do not stop there! For the best sound, wood blocks and graters, scratchers and spoons are incorporated into the mix, adding a percussive heft to the soaring vocals.

Over the past several decades, parang has changed in some significant ways, accounting for broader developments in Trinidad and Tobago’s cosmopolitan musical culture. While the caroling-type tradition is still practiced in some places during the holidays, larger and more organized ensembles have expanded the style, doing much to professionalize the once informal sub-genre. In the course of doing so, the parang season has been extended significantly . What was once a holiday custom now takes up much of the year, beginning in October and running through January, and culminating in a series of national contests hosted by National Parang Association of Trinidad and Tobago (NPATT). With the addition of new instruments, the implementation of riddims and more English language, parang has aligned more closely with mainstream Trinidadian culture.

Perhaps most exciting are the recent developments…In an unprecedented announcement, the NPATT ruled: regarding all competitions and official instrumentation, parang now officially incorporates the steelpan! While in the past some groups have played steelpan, now for the first time it will be considered as an official component of the parang ensemble and will be judged alongside the more traditional instruments in the competitions that define success for parranderos. It would seem the addition of pan is a smart move on the part of the NPATT, given plethora of new possibilities available to the instrumental expansion, such as soca-parang, and will likely increase versatility of the genre. and we can’t wait to hear it!

For the original post: Bailan los parranderos! • Afropop Worldwide.

Categories
diaspora Festivals

Thousands line up for West Indian Day parade in New York

Metro New York reports on the 2012 West Indian/Caribbean-American Carnival, which is hosted annually in Brooklyn New York.

Grey skies and threats of rain didn’t deter the thousands who celebrated New York’s thriving Caribbean heritage with a vibrant parade on the streets of Crown Heights on Labor Day.

Participants were covered in body paint and elaborate feathered costumes. People practice all year long for parade dances.

People waved flags, played drums, danced and wore bright costumes of feathers, sequins and little else.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Governor Andrew Cuomo and Parade Grand Marshal Harry Belafonte all joined in to honor Caribbean cultures.

The NYPD had no reports of violence or unrest at the parade, but there were two shootings and a stabbing after the parade, according to the Daily News. Last year, a bystander was killed by a police officer’s stray bullet during a shooting after the parade.

For original report: Metro – Thousands line up for West Indian Day parade in New York.

Categories
Festivals Music Steel Pan

Oasis Youth Steel Pan at Trini Flag Raising

Oasis Youth Steel Pan at Flag Raising 3 from Ken Archer on Vimeo.

The Oasis Youth Steel Pan of Newark, New jersey, under the leadership of “Mauby”, provided musical entertainment at the Sixth Annual Flag Raising in celebration of Trinidad and Tobago’s Independence. The event was hosted at the East Orange City Hall on August 31, 2012. This year marked the 50th Anniversary of the twin-island state’s Independence.

Categories
diaspora Festivals

50th Anniversary of Trinidad and Tobago Independence Celebrated in East Orange, NJ

On August 31, 2012, the Sixth Annual Flag Raising ceremony was held in the city of East Orange, New Jersey to commemorate Trinidad and Tobago’s National Independence.


2012 marked the 50th anniversary of Independence for the twin-island Caribbean state and this gave additional significance to this year’s flag raising.

The event was led by Gail Bell-Bonnette, who has been at the forefront of Trinidad and Caribbean cultural activities in the Oranges. Trinidad and Tobago nationals from East Orange and surrounding cities such as Orange, Irvington, and Newark gathered in their hundreds to pay homage to the nation of their birth on the attainment of this jubilee milestone, having overcome slavery and colonialism.

The Mayor of the City of East Orange, Mr. Robert Bowser, brought greetings to the festivities on behalf of himself and the City Council. He urged Trinidad and Tobagonians and all Caribbean nationals resident in the city to participate fully in the politics and general life of the city and to value education, which ensures the foundation for the protection of the freedom and liberties gained. The organizing committee, in conjunction with the New Jersey Carnival Committee, also presented awards to community activists and leaders for their contribution, dedication, and hard work towards the well-being of the Trinidadian community. Many of them had assisted in the East Orange Carnival, which was held for 21 years under the leadership of Gail Bell-Bonnette. In 2012, these faithful are making efforts to successfully re-institute the Carnival in the Oranges, New Jersey.

The crowd, which came out to witness and support the raising of the Trinidad and Tobago flag, was treated to the music of the Oasis Youth Steelband, a rhythm section, and DJ.

Categories
Emancipation Festivals

Cuba: Celebration of Anglo Caribbean Emancipation Day

Ciego de Avila, Cuba, Aug 1 (Prensa Latina) The immigrants and descendants of the Anglo-speaking islands, residing in this central province of Cuba, are celebrating the day of emancipation from the slavery of the English colonies.

Since early hours the sounds of drums, bongoes and congas united to the rhythm of the calypso have been greeting those arriving in the community called Jamaica Town, in the municipality of Baraguá.

It is one of the most populous neighbourhoods in the country, where immigrants cohabit and are descendants of almost all the English-speaking islands of the region.

The musical-dance group La Cinta is the center of these celebrations that developed starting in 1917 and have become the most representative of Caribbean culture with roots in Cuba.

Founded on September 20, 1975, the group presents dances and songs characteristic of Jamaican folklore, fused with Cuban rhythms, as in the introduction to the famous song Guantanamera.

The traditional show will begin with games like cricket, tug of war, the stick and the Mock Man or Muñecón.

The celebration began with a parade, headed by the Donkey, a dancer dressed up as a burro, giving a distinctive touch to these Caribbean dances.

The narrow streets of the town filled with people who also make the festivity theirs.

During the day they eat typical foods, elaborated by the members of the community, ranging from the bread with lemonade, the wine of the soril flower, rice with coconut, fish with sauce, flour with okra, Black Cake and coconut bread.

The parties of August 1 have become one of the most genuine representations in the culture, customs and language of the Jamaican community residing in Cuba.

In 1833, slavery was abolished in all the colonies of the United Kingdom, for what is now a day of joy for the community of immigrants of the English-speaking Caribbean islands in Cuba.

For original post: Prensa Latina News Agency – Cuba: Celebration of Anglo Caribbean Emancipation Day.

Categories
Emancipation Festivals

Understanding the value of Emancipation

The following article, addressing the value of Emancipation celebrations, appeared in Trinidad and Tobago’s Newsday, Wednesday, August 1 2012.

 Khafra Kambon, chairman of the Emancipation Support Committee.

As the Emancipation Support Committee (ESC) marks its 20th anniversary this year, chairman Khafra Kambon takes a look at self-awareness and self-liberation:

“The Emancipation Committee is a force or development in all aspects and areas of human development,” says Khafra Kambon, the chairman of the Emancipation Support Committee. The ESC focus is on Trinidadians of African descent, with the objective of re-opening their minds to the concept of what it means to be liberated.

Throughout its existence this committee has made positive impact on the nation’s people inevitably causing individuals to be freed from their ‘shackled’ minds, economical status and social inabilities.

??It is said by many that the issues of slavery have not been effectively addressed in society, thereby causing residual lingering effects of great trauma on persons.

For the past 20 years, the ESC has journeyed in raising the awareness and importance of one’s individuality.

??The ESC has recognised there are reinforced negative connotations such as “black, ugly” and “black and ugly,” that have caused severe barriers in the positive development of the African people.

For that reason, many Africans take these terms for granted, accepting it as a norm and live comfortably with it.

Eradicating the stigma and this belief is just another important function that the committee has untiringly performed throughout the years.

“Through this process, when negative elements are shown on television, printed in the newspaper, aired on radio or depicted in advertisements, individuals are able to open their eyes and filter out negative messages, still maintaining their self-importance and sanity,” said Kambon.

“Emancipation helps to open our eyes to see these things and understand them for what they are whether unconscious or conscious. It creates the strongest positive images of ‘African-ness’ in the society.”

In terms of economics, the ESC showcases numerous and diverse work individuals perform from within the community. On one level, the ESC provide a platform for sale at the annual Emancipation Village which is open to the public five days until the public holiday at the end of July. It also serves as an opportunity for exposure.

In addition, a special entrepreneur workshop focusing on financial management and business is provided. ??This rich source of business know-how is given by professionals in different fields. Through this venture, entrepreneurs have been able to spur a lot of businesses.

??The celebration of African awareness, Emancipation Day on August 1, culminates in annual parade through the streets of Port-of-Spain. ??The procession brings a togetherness and pride (not only with people of African descent) but also allows persons to enjoy themselves with abandon and encourages social connections.

“It gives people a different feeling of themselves, they understand who they are and they project themselves and their heritage proudly, through their garments, movement and their expressions,” Kambon said. ??Throughout the years the committee has continuously made a positive impact on the lives of everyone, thus desensitising the stereotype of the African culture.

For the original article: Understanding the Value of Emancipation

Categories
Community Organizations Emancipation Festivals

Celebration of Emancipation

The Committee for the Commemoration of Emancipation Day is inviting everyone to join in the commemoration and internationalizing of Emancipation Day.

This event would be on August 4th, 2012 at Prospect Park, Oriental Pavilion, Brooklyn New York.

Start time is 2:00pm, with a short parade beginning at the corner of Parkside and Flatbush Aves., and entering the park at Lincoln Road and Ocean Ave.  There would be a spiritual and cultural component to the event.

No matter where you are from, whether it is the Caribbean Islands, North or South America, bring your country’s Flag and make this a family day.

Emancipation of the slaves is the Ancestors and our business.

Thanks to the the Committee for the Commemoration of Emancipation Day for the information.

 

Categories
Festivals

Cuba: Caribbean Festival of Fire Closes With Devil Burning Ceremony

Santiago de Cuba, Jul 10 (Prensa Latina):  A flood of people danced the conga down to Puerto Santiago to watch the traditional Burning of the Devil ceremony, closing the activities of the 32nd Caribbean Festival.

On the final day, the artist Alberto Lescay and the high priest of the Regla Palo Monte in this eastern Cuban city presented the Mpaka “symbol of the holiday” to the Deputy Minister of Culture for Colombia, Maria Claudia Lopez, and the Ambassador of that South American nation in Cuba, Gustavo Bell.

In this way, the small island of Martinique, guest of honor for the holiday, passed the guest baton to the culture of Colombia’s Caribbean, motherland of the vallenato and the famous Barranquilla Carnival.

After the customary blessing of the Santiago people, the jubilant procession began to close the Festival of Fire, which is just as colorful and spiritually generous as the popular Parade of the Snake, which happened just a few days ago.

From the Plaza de Martes to the sea, various groups danced the conga, demonstrating traditional culture of the Greater Caribbean.

Foreign delegations, including countries such as Argentina and Uruguay, contributed their own music, dances and costumes, displaying the diversity of identity in this region.

The Conga de los Hoyos, the most acclaimed in this city, brought a virtual sea of people dancing down the central street of Enramada toward the sea.

There, a giant woven stick figure metaphorically representing the Devil at this bacchanal, was cremated, exorcising evil spirits and thus, ensuring well-being until next year.

For original report: Caribbean Festival of Fire Closes

Categories
Community Organizations diaspora Emancipation

Caribbean Maroons Hope Tourism Can Save Culture

The following Bloomberg News Business Week report, written by David Mc Fadden, was republished by Repeating Islands.

In a backwoods town along a river cutting between green mountains, quick-footed men and women spin and stomp to the beat of drums. One dancer waving a knife is wrapped head-to-foot in leafy branches, his flashing eyes barely visible through the camouflage.

This traditional dance re-enacts the Jamaican Maroons’ specialty: the ambush. It was once a secret ritual of the fierce bands of escaped slaves who won freedom by launching raids on planters’ estates and repelling invasions of their forest havens with a mastery of guerrilla warfare.

But on this day, descendants of those 18th century fugitives are performing for tourists, academics, filmmakers and other curious outsiders in a fenced “Asafu” dancing yard in Charles Town, a once-moribund Maroon settlement in eastern Jamaica that seemed destined to lose its traditions until revivalists gradually brought it back.

Maroons in the Caribbean are increasingly showcasing their unique culture for visitors in hopes that heritage tourism will guarantee jobs for the young generation and preserve what remains of their centuries-old practices in mostly remote settlements. The basic idea has been tried around the world, from the Gusii people of Kenya to the artisans of the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina.

“If we don’t follow in the footsteps of our foreparents we will find ourselves on the heap of history,” said Wallace Sterling, the “colonel” of the Windward Maroon community of Moore Town. It is one of Jamaica’s four semi-autonomous Maroon tracts, each governed by an elected colonel, a title bestowed on Maroon leaders since their battles with the British army, and a council appointed by the leader.

Trying to counter the endless tide of migration and assimilation, long secretive Maroons are more and more going public with the old ways — singing sacred songs, drumming, making herbal medicine, talking to ancestral spirits, woodcarving, hunting and “jerking” wild pigs. Maroons are credited with inventing Jamaica’s “jerk” style of cooking, in which aromatic spices are rubbed or stuffed into meat before it is roasted on an open fire.

The turn to small-scale tourism for income can safeguard the Maroons’ future and their cultural identity, leaders say. They say it has boosted pride among younger Maroons and encouraged some to stay in their rural hometowns. Other money-making opportunities are scarce in the communities of modest cement-block homes and tiny shops selling cold drinks and snacks.

“For a long time, it’s been very difficult to keep the young people because they tend to leave for the cities to seek work. But now we can train tour guides and our people can sell their crafts, their banana and coconuts,” said Fearon Williams, the colonel of Accompong. An annual Jan. 6 celebration draws thousands of visitors to the isolated town, which sits among rocky cliffs and limestone towers in northwestern Jamaica. “Tourism is making us stronger.”

A tour bus now comes weekly to Charles Town, a village whose colonel, Frank Lumsden, worked as a commodities trader in Chicago before returning to Jamaica in the late 1990s to focus on his ancestral roots.

There are also Maroons in Suriname, on the South American mainland, where escaped slaves over the centuries built their own African-centered societies in sparsely populated Amazonian forests. Suriname’s Maroons also say a broadening emphasis on ecotourism is helping fight cultural disintegration.

“The world is turning into one large village, so it makes no sense for Maroon villages to keep out tourists. Tourists and the money they bring stimulate people in the Maroon communities to produce the products that represent their culture,” said Ronny Asabina, a Maroon who serves in Suriname’s legislature.

But most acknowledge the obstacles facing Maroons, who are estimated to number in the thousands in Jamaica and the tens of thousands in Suriname. The passing along of traditions and customs from one generation to the next has long been weakened by the lures and necessities of modern life.


In Scott’s Hall, a subsistence farming community in eastern Jamaica, longtime colonel Noel Prehay said he hopes tourism can provide a place for many of his townspeople to relearn their traditions.

Prehay said devotion to clandestine spiritual rituals is strong among the town’s ever-dwindling number of elderly residents, as is their knowledge of the Maroon’s Kromanti language, which is closely related to the Twi spoken in parts of the West African nation of Ghana.

“If a person is mad or if they are sick, we can make a healing dance. Our Obeah is a good Obeah,” Prehay said, referring to an Afro-Caribbean religion that involves channeling spiritual forces and is feared by some in Jamaica’s countryside, where superstitions about shamanism and the occult run deep.

But visitors are very rare in his poor town along a dusty, rutted road about a 45-minute drive from Jamaica’s capital, Kingston. Unlike the other three Maroon communities in Jamaica, Scott’s Hall has no museum, dancing grounds or other attractions aimed at tourists.

So Prehay worries that most young Maroons will still continue to leave.

“I think the young people are willing and ready to accept the teaching of the culture. But the continual migration to Kingston, to London, to Canada is difficult,” the 70-year-old Prehay said, pointing to surrounding slopes that were farms when he was a young man but are now overgrown with bamboo.

Settlements of escaped slaves emerged in many places in the Western Hemisphere, including the U.S., but the Maroons’ biggest success came in Jamaica, where they helped the British expel the Spanish and then turned on the new rulers, wreaking havoc across an island that was then one of the world’s largest sugar producers.

The Maroons’ name derives from the Spanish word “cimarron,” which means “untamed” or “the wild ones.” Descendants of the warrior Ashanti and Fante tribes of West Africa, the Maroons became adept at surviving in tangled forests in the mountains.

Jamaica’s Maroons avoided open warfare, relying on their knowledge of the terrain, camouflaging themselves with leaves and communicating with the abeng, a cow horn whose call carries for miles.

After nearly a century of fighting, the British finally granted the Maroons formal freedom in a 1739 treaty signed in a cave a few miles outside Accompong by legendary Maroon leader Cudjoe and British army Col. John Guthrie.

But in return for their autonomy, the Maroons agreed to help the British hunt down future runaway slaves. That arrangement may be at the root of a sense of isolation some Maroons felt from other Jamaicans and long kept them living apart. Maroon separatism began to fade with the ebbing of colonialism in Jamaica, which became independent in 1962.

Not all Maroons are confident that relying on tourism can successfully bring back cultural traditions.

“It will take a giant effort if you can find the will. I am not sure that the will is there,” said C.L.G. Harris, a highly respected 95-year-old who was Moore Town’s colonel for decades and worked hard to modernize the community — sometimes, he says, at the expense of traditional religious practices.

Anthropologist Kenneth Bilby, whose book “True-Born Maroons” is based on years of research, much of it conducted while living in Moore Town in the 1970s, said it remains to be seen whether heritage tourism can preserve indigenous communities.

“It’s really quite a complex question whether or not communities can try to develop aspects of their culture and commodify them without also suffering certain losses or negative consequences,” Bilby said from his home in Colorado. Some experts fear that cultural tourism can introduce harmful influences or can make communities into parodies of themselves.

Still, the message of cultural identity is reaching some young Maroons.

“What I’ve learned is that without the culture, you’re nothing,” said Rodney Rose, Charles Town’s 29-year-old abeng blower and museum treasurer who until recently had to travel outside the village for employment. “And while we young Maroons are learning, people from overseas can also learn.”

For the original report: Caribbean Maroons

See also: Caribbean Maroons Hope Tourism Can Save Culture « Repeating Islands.

Categories
Festivals Religion

Kingston festival “Kingston Pon Di River”

The following report, written by Vinette K. Pryce, was published in Caribbean Life News on May 9, 2012.


The second annual staging of a cultural assembly billed “Kingston Pon Di River” reintroduced an African aspect of Jamaica’s culture previously ignored or shunned at mainstream celebrations and heritage festivals.

The literary, arts and music festival held at Boone Hall last week featured The St. Thomas Revival Band, a group that were neither promoted nor announced on the billing.

Introduced by Aloun Ndombet-Assamba, the island’s high commissioner to England who emceed an evening offering of drumming featuring talents from Cuba and Jamaica, the added attraction marshaled tourists, visitors and nationals to experience what is usually a private religious ceremony practiced to pay homage to Africa, the regarded Holy Land of the Pocomania sect.

Following the instrumental feast, a procession of men, women and children dressed in red, white and blue emerged from the dark, grassy, hillside setting into the light of the moon where awe-struck patrons watched with curiosity.

With heads tied to fashion a turban, their red, plaid, bandana fabric represented the national cloth and signified a unity between religion and country.

The members of the group seemed entranced by their music as they walked to a white tent where a long table prepared an altar and became the central focus for what ensued as a spirited, ritualistic, revival ceremony.

“The Indians share their culture; the Chinese, Syrians and Jews too, we as Jamaicans should embrace our total heritage,” Dollis Campbell, one of the three promoters representing Dynamic Event Services said.

It was at her urging that the Yallahs-based church group found a welcoming audience at the riverside, weekend fest.

Far from somber, the serious worshippers proved to be missionaries of their faith, ancestry and country.

Without engaging recruitment tactics to patrons, they impressed a number of guests who remained riveted until the midnight end of the ceremony.

Dressed similarly to a Roman Catholic Pope, his head to feet ceremonial dress distinguished him from his congregation and other religious believers in the group.

“People think we are about obeah…but we light candles, sing and praise our Lord…that’s all we do,” Pastor Jonathan Williams said.

To see the way he sprayed mouthfuls of water or liquor into the air can only be described as artistic and perhaps akin to rituals performed in Brazil or Haiti.

He seemed to direct the motions of the lively, musical revivalists who segued from each song singing the gospel of their faith.

They employed the tenets of the festival to deliver literature, art and music to an audience perhaps un-familiar with their mode of worship.

Allegedly rooted in West African traditions, revivalist culture is mostly regarded as an underground religious rite practiced by a segment of the society known as Pocomanianians.

The authentic Afro-Christian religious folk form evolved during the eighteenth to nineteenth century and was regarded in traditional religious circles as a vehicle of rebellion in colonial times. Pocomania reportedly emerged during the 1860s in churches which exuberantly fused African and Protestant performance styles, images, and traditions.

The ritual meetings involve prayers, dances, and rhythmic drumming.

Participants often go into a trance.

However, on the Saturday night that celebrated the 140th anniversary of the capital, Caribbean city, an abbreviated ritual minus magic offered a glimpse into Jamaica’s African ancestral tradition.

A long table filled with fruits of every kind, Duck bread (special ceremonial dough) colored candles, flowers, and beverages formed the central focus of attention.

Ceremoniously staged to thank the ancestors for granting powers of healing and life, the gifts to the spirits are later shared among a congregation.

Each colored candle allegedly represented a significant aspect of the ceremony.

For first-time witnesses it was the candles that captivated the most attention when the preacher indicated that when lit, they could be the vehicle to goodwill and hoped-for wishes.

Individuals voluntarily lit particular candles they hoped will provide fulfillments the pastor allegedly relayed to ancestors. A number of prior skeptics and cynics allayed their fears and proceeded to the altar in order to seek positive enticements.

“This is my first time seeing this but I am totally impressed and proud of my country and culture. I am happy I came, I have learnt a great deal,” Norma Davis said after the ceremony.

With a band of musicians constantly fueling infectious sounds, the entire audience joined the revelry and embraced the nation’s cultural heritage.

Janet Silvera, Dollis Campbell, and Millicent Lynch are the three founders of DES credited for enlightening the sophisticated, elite patronage to their milestone anniversary feature and event championing the historic dateline.

Perhaps, the highlight of the festival, this presentation is being hailed with appreciation by nationals and visitors alike.

Kingston has had its allure but until recently few visitors could boast the privilege of sitting up close to witness the legacy and rich, African tradition still practiced by revivalists in modern day Jamaica.

For the original report: Kingston festival attracts visitors and locals alike • Caribbean Life.