About the Haitian Jazz movement. The birth of American Jazz was not entirely intuitive and its evolution became very scientific. The birth of Afro-Cuban Jazz as well as Brazilian Jazz, though influenced by American Jazz, resulted from studies and the devotion of developing respectively those styles deeply rooted on the respective culture and music of the Cubans and the Brazilians. The Haitian Jazz movement reflects a poor imitation of different personal styles of many foreign talents whose works are internationally respected and became the Standards of the American Blue Book of Jazz. An analysis of the repertoire of our Jazz musicians does not reflect a balance between Haitian music and the American jazz concept. In fact, most of our Jazz musicians either have no clue about our own music, or fail totally to learn about it, and to apply the many aspects and facets of our music that are still unfortunately unwritten. One could understand that any Haitian Jazz movement would emphasize a serious dissection of our music whose elements could have been included in any Jazz concept whether it is influenced by American, Afro-Cuban or Brazilian jazz. I find really amazing that one feels inspired by a tune of John Coltrane and adds a layer of Haitian rhythm whose melodic phrasing is not related to such a rhythm. Another example would be to entitle a song “Yanvalou Blue” when in fact the layer of the beat is a Mayi. This is very important because each Haitian rhythm suggests strongly its own melodic phrasing. The melody of an Ibo is totally different from the one of a Congo. The melody of a Rabòday is again totally different from the one of a Nago. Though intuitive, there exists fundamental elements endemic to our music, and this should not be neglected when playing Haitian Jazz, if one wants to apply the notion of Jazz to this genre. I, Gifrants, call it “Natif” and as I have mentioned so many times, such a sophisticated approach should not be the work one man, does not belong to a man and does not pertain to a personal style but to an authentic genre within the spectrum of Haitian music. The time to be serious about our music is long overdue. The elitist aspect of the Haitian jazz movement added to this frivolous and ridiculous snobbish attitude that goes with it does not weigh too much on the viability as well as the validity of such a movement.
Posted on: Fri, 07 Jun 2013 02:48:35 +0000
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