In spaces of violence, scholars and activists have typically addressed music as sites of resistance. In postcolonial Caribbean, the focus of most studies unsurprisingly has thus been placed on the work music has done for the oppressed—or conversely, on the ways the (neo)colonial regimes have used music to increase their control over the masses. Until recently, few publications have addressed the music that has been performed to fortify and gather people together in times of hardship. In this case, what is at stake is not so much a matter of 'us and them' or of resistance, but rather the ways in which the 'us' is mobilized to strengthen senses of belonging and networks of solidarity. Amidst the escalating everyday violence since the mid-1990s, party music in Trinidad continues to thrive. Instead of dismissing such music as merely a source of escapism or hedonism, I want to examine what makes it so compelling and what it does for people. This paper is based on in-depth study of soca music making and mumerous ethnographic interviews with Trinidadian soca artists and fans over the past 15 years.
Tambrin music on the Caribbean island of Tobago is traditionally performed to entertain people at weddings and other family celebrations. The genre is also connected with healing ceremonies and the belief in ancestral spirits. It can cause trance and possession. Nevertheless, today’s musicians hardly ever play in these traditional contexts. Opportunities to perform arise from political events, folklore festivals, and concerts for tourists. In consideration of theoretical views concerning cultural contacts, preservation, and staged respectively participatory performances, the article deals with different forms of musical interaction and different ways of playing depending on repertory, individual performers, and performance conditions, based on fieldwork conducted between 1995 and 2009, thus comprising the music of two generations of musicians.
Considers the characteristic features of Garífuna music, which are intrinsically related to the history of slavery, warfare, miscegenation, and resistance of this people of African and Caribbean ancestry, living today mainly on the Atlantic Coast of Central America and in the U.S. Based on his analysis of the Wanaragua or Yancunú rhythm, performed in Livingston, Guatemala, by dancers wearing shell rattles (illacu) tied to their ankles, and a musical ensemble consisting of two drums (garaón) and gourd rattles (sisira), the author examines the metric ambiguity of its basic “time line” or 'clave' of 3:3:2 as well as the rhythmic flexibility and unpredictability with which the dancers and musicians relate to it, as a musical expression of the social and cultural conditions created by that history, especially by the processes of miscegenation.
The Afro-Uruguayan candombe exemplifies a creative processes reacting to the 'whitening' of its practice in the context of the national appropriation of music created by Afro-Uruguayans and long despised in this very eurocentric country. The group Afrogama which describes itself as traditional and militant, taking its inspiration from Africa and the African-American religions, is 'blackening' these musical features and choreographical gestures. The dynamics and the content of these games of color in the candombe should be understood in the national and transnational context of the definition of Afrodescendance in Latin America. The category 'Black music' acquires meaning if it is seen as an ethnomusicological category which articulates musical, social, and political dynamics, bearing in mind the specific nature of music and dance in the processes of identity building., unedited non–English abstract received by RILM] À partir de l’exemple du candombe afro-uruguayen, je propose d’analyser comment, dans un contexte d’appropriation nationale d’une musique créée par les Afro-Uruguayens et longtemps méprisée dans un pays très eurocentriste, on assiste à des processus de création en réaction à ce « blanchiment » de la pratique. Le groupe Afrogama, qui se définit comme traditionnel et militant, « noircit » le trait musical et le geste chorégraphique en s’inspirant de l’Afrique et des religions afro-américaines. Les dynamiques et le contenu de ces jeux de couleurs dans le candombe doivent être compris dans un contexte national et transnational de définition de l’afrodescendance en Amérique Latine. La catégorie « musique noire » prend son sens si on l’envisage comme une catégorie ethnomusicologique qui articule dynamiques musicales, sociales et politiques, tout en considérant la nature particulière de la musique et de la danse dans les processus de construction identitaire.
Discusses the historical constructions effected by the social sciences and the institution of Carnaval which have contributed to establishing two forms of musical and choreographical expression from the Brazilian state of Pernambudo as opposing models: maracatu-nação, supposedly the Black or Afro model, traditional, ancient, urban, and religious, and maracatu-rural, the so-called syncretic, modern, recent, rural and magical-religious model. In the face of this categorization, the two maracatus prefer tp be distinguished on the basis of their specific rhythms, respectively de-baque-virado and de-baque-soltoxx. Practitioners identify more with their specific practice than with the ideas it conveys and seem to form their community around codifications and usages in which ethnicity is meaningless. Moreover, in Brazil culture, the term 'black' is inseparable from the term 'popular': conformism and resistance, performative mode, improvisation and continuum of a continually changing tradition. Its coherence is more about mastering an aesthetic activity than about a racial ontology confined in 'the Black experience'. Negra or popular, this music thus differs from the 'other music', where tradition figures as a threshhold to be crossed., unedited non–English abstract received by RILM] Cet article tente de montrer les constructions historiques opérées par les sciences sociales et l’institution carnavalesque ayant contribué à instituer en contre-modèles deux formes d’expression musicales et chorégraphiques de l’état de Pernambuco au Brésil : le maracatu-nação, modèle dit noir ou afro, traditionnel, ancien, urbain et religieux, et le maracatu-rural, modèle dit syncrétique, moderne, récent, rural et magico-religieux. Devant ces catégorisations, les deux maracatus préfèrent se distinguer par leur rythme spécifique, respectivement de-baque-virado et de-baque-solto. Les praticiens s’identifient davantage à leur pratique qu’aux représentations qu’elle véhicule et semblent former une collectivité autour de codifications et modes de faire dans lesquelles l’ethnicité ne fait pas sens. D’ailleurs, au Brésil, la caractérisation « noire » s’est confondue avec la caractérisation « populaire » de la culture : conformisme et résistance, mode performatif, improvisation et continuum de la tradition en permanente reformulation. Ses logiques concernent plus le savoir mener une conduite esthétique qu’une ontologie raciale recluse dans « l’expérience noire ». Negra ou popular, la musique se distinguerait ainsi de l’ « autre musique », où la tradition émerge comme un seuil à transgresser.
A brief introduction about Mexican nativism as an obstacle to thinking about cultural diversity, especially the Afro-Mexican presence, and a short echo of Philip Tagg's Open Letter are followed by an outline of the socio-historical genesis of the cumbia and the chilena. A comparative musical study (of national and Afro-Mexican cumbia, indigenous chilena and Afro-Mexican chilena) seeks to establish whether these are distinct 'black' musical practices. Since this music is also dance and text, these other two elements are also examined to determine to what extent it is legitimate to discuss them as 'black' practices. It is also essential to learn whether these forms of music are influenced by the recording industry and if so, to assess the consequences in terms of commercial labelling. The results of these inquiries, placed in the context of the movement towards negritude presently emerging on the Costa Chica, provide aspects of an answer to the eponymous question, unedited non–English abstract received by RILM] Après une brève introduction sur l’indigénisme au Mexique comme obstacle pour penser la diversité culturelle, notamment les présences afro-mexicaines, l’article fera brièvement écho à la lettre ouverte de Philip Tagg, pour ensuite esquisser une genèse socio-historique de la cumbia et de la chilena. Puis, il sera nécessaire de procéder à une étude musicale comparative (entre la cumbia nationale et afro-mexicaine, la chilena indigène et la chilena afro-mexicaine) afin de voir si elles sont des pratiques musicales différenciées « noires ». La musique n’étant pas que musique mais aussi danse et texte, on interrogera de la même façon ces deux éléments pour voir aussi dans quelle mesure peut-on en parler de pratiques « noires ». En outre, il conviendra de voir si ces musiques sont soumises à l’industrie disquaire et si tel était le cas, mesurer les conséquences en termes d’étiquetage commercial. Finalement, au regard des résultats formulés, je tenterai d’apporter des éléments concrets de réponse par rapport à la question initiale en les mettant en perspective avec un mouvement de négritude qui est en train de voir le jour sur la Costa Chica.
Examines the meanings of the marvelous in the context of the Afro-Brazilian ritual called the Reinado de Nossa Senhora do Rosário, according to the way it is applied in the song lyrics and in participants’ verbal discourses. Analyses were based on participants’ perspectives about the origin and history of their religious tradition, which is based on their enslaved ancestors’ experiences of pain. Those facts and events still highlight the sense of belonging to this tradition nowadays and make their performative acts meaningful, significant, and thus wonderful., unedited non–English abstract received by RILM] Os significados da ‘maravilha’ no contexto do Reinado de Nossa Senhora do Rosário, tal como o termo é utilizado nos cantos e nas elaborações discursivas dos congadeiros, são aqui abordados a partir da perspectiva desses participantes sobre a origem e o percurso histórico de sua tradição religiosa, calcada na experiencia da dor de seus ancestrais escravizados. Tais fatos e eventos ainda motivam o pertencimento a essa tradição no presente e preenchem de sentido, de significância e, consequentemente, de maravilha as ações performáticas atuais.
Examines the history of a genre that spans several continents and several centuries. Material from Mexico, Cuba, France, and Great Britain are brought together to create anew, expand upon, and critique the standard histories of danzón narrated by Mexico's danzón experts and others. In these standard histories, origins and nationality are key to the constitution of genres that are racialized and moralized for political ends. Danzón, its antecedents, and successors are treated as generic equivalents despite being quite different. From the danzón on, these genres are positioned as being the products of individual, male originators and their nations. Africa is treated as a conceptual nation, and Africanness as something extra that racializes hegemonic European music-dance forms. Political leanings and strategies determine whether these music-dance forms are interpreted, adopted, or co-opted as being black or white.
Disputes the idea that cultural/poetico-musical characteristics are integral to or combined with the biological criteria which define ethnicities and races. Samba was born at the turn of the 20th century in working-class, multiethnic neighborhoods of Rio de Janeiro. With its syncopated rhythm characteristic of celebrations in Black Brazilian communities, it is an urban genre associated with the early days of Carnaval which was widely broadcast on the radio in the 1930s. It thus lost its local and regional character and enjoyed worldwide recognition. Controlled by the Estado Novo, samba became 'civilized' and assumed an important symbolic role in building a Brazilian identity, both real and ideal. The result of a long and complex process of hybridization, the samba transcends and expresses more than a century of racial and social affiliations and tensions ubiquitous in Brazilian society, ultimately becoming an ideological matrix and a model of cultural fusion. The role and exceptional creativity of certain artists (Sinhô, N. Rosa, Zé Keti, C. Buarque...) and the social and aesthetic processes which contributed to the recomposition of the elements of samba are examined from a sociosemiotic standpoint which draws as well on a major audiovisual source and relevant works published in Brazil., unedited non–English abstract received by RILM] Cette contribution remet en question l’idée selon laquelle aux critères biologiques définissant les ethnies et les races se trouveraient intégrées ou agrégées des caractéristiques culturelles – poético-musicales en l’occurrence. Le samba naît au tournant du xxe siècle dans les quartiers populaires de Rio de Janeiro, marqués par leur composition pluriethnique. Rythme syncopé privilégié des célébrations pratiquées dans les communautés noires brésiliennes, ce genre urbain est associé aux débuts du Carnaval et abondamment radiodiffusé dans les années 1930. Il perd alors son caractère communautaire et régional et connaît bientôt une consécration mondiale. Contrôlé par l’Estado Novo, le samba se « civilise » et joue un rôle symbolique de premier plan dans la construction, réelle et idéelle, de l’identité brésilienne. Résultat d’un long et complexe processus d’hybridation, le samba transcende et articule sur plus d’un siècle les appartenances et les tensions raciales et sociales, omniprésentes dans la société brésilienne, au point de s’ériger en matrice idéologique et modèle de fusion culturelle. L’approche sociosémiotique de ce travail, qui repose sur l’écoute et visionnage d’un important fonds audiovisuel et sur l’étude des ouvrages publiés au Brésil, met en lumière le rôle et la créativité singulière de certains artistes (Sinhô, N. Rosa, Zé Keti, C. Buarque...) et les processus sociaux et esthétiques qui ont contribué à la recomposition de ses éléments.
