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Big Drum
Big Drum is a genre, a musical instrument, and traditional African religion from the Windward Islands. It is a kind of Caribbean music, associated mostly closely with the music of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Music of Guadeloupe, Carriacou in Grenada and in the music of Saint Kitts and Nevis. Origin All big drum celebration is accompanied by the boula drum. The word ''boula'' can refer to at least four different drums played in the Caribbean music area. The Guadeloupean ''boula'' is a hand drum, similar to the '' tambou bèlè'', and is used in ''gwo ka'' and special occasions likes wakes, wrestling matches and Carnival celebrations. It is a hand drum that plays low-pitched sounds and is played single-handed and transversally. The ''boula'' of Carriacou is also a hand drum, now most often made of rum casks. It is also called the ''tambou dibas'', and is used in the Big Drum tradition. The ''boula'' of Trinidad and Tobago accompanies the stick-fighting dance called '' kalend ...
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Musical Instrument
A musical instrument is a device created or adapted to make musical sounds. In principle, any object that produces sound can be considered a musical instrument—it is through purpose that the object becomes a musical instrument. A person who plays a musical instrument is known as an instrumentalist. The history of musical instruments dates to the beginnings of human culture. Early musical instruments may have been used for rituals, such as a horn to signal success on the hunt, or a drum in a religious ceremony. Cultures eventually developed composition and performance of melodies for entertainment. Musical instruments evolved in step with changing applications and technologies. The date and origin of the first device considered a musical instrument is disputed. The oldest object that some scholars refer to as a musical instrument, a simple flute, dates back as far as 50,000 - 60,000 years. Some consensus dates early flutes to about 40,000 years ago. However, most historians be ...
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Carnival
Carnival is a Catholic Christian festive season that occurs before the liturgical season of Lent. The main events typically occur during February or early March, during the period historically known as Shrovetide (or Pre-Lent). Carnival typically involves public celebrations, including events such as parades, public street parties and other entertainments, combining some elements of a circus. Elaborate costumes and masks allow people to set aside their everyday individuality and experience a heightened sense of social unity.Bakhtin, Mikhail. 1984. ''Rabelais and his world''. Translated by H. Iswolsky. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Original edition, ''Tvorchestvo Fransua Rable i narodnaia kul'tura srednevekov'ia i Renessansa'', 1965. Participants often indulge in excessive consumption of alcohol, meat, and other foods that will be forgone during upcoming Lent. Traditionally, butter, milk, and other animal products were not consumed "excessively", rather, their stoc ...
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Grenadian Music
The music of Grenada has included the work of several major musicians, including Eddie Bullen, David Emmanuel, one of the best-selling reggae performers ever, and Mighty Sparrow, a calypsonian. The island is also known for jazz, most notably including Eddie Bullen, a pianist, songwriter and record producer currently residing in Canada. Kingsley Etienne, a keyboardist, while the Grenadan-American Joe Country & the Islanders have made a name in country music. African dances brought to Grenada survive in an evolved form, as have European quadrilles and picquets. Some of the most popular recent styles of these dances include "Heel-and-Toe" and "Carriacou Big Drum and Quadrille", with popular dancers including Willie Redhead, Thelma Phillips, Renalph Gebon and the Beewee Ballet. Independence in 1974 launched a Grenadian national identity which was exemplified in the calypso of the time, which tended to be intensely patriotic. More modern calypso performers have experimented, us ...
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Caribbean Musical Instruments
The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean) and the surrounding coasts. The region is southeast of the Gulf of Mexico and the North American mainland, east of Central America, and north of South America. Situated largely on the Caribbean Plate, the region has more than 700 islands, islets, reefs and cays (see the list of Caribbean islands). Island arcs delineate the eastern and northern edges of the Caribbean Sea: The Greater Antilles and the Lucayan Archipelago on the north and the Lesser Antilles and the on the south and east (which includes the Leeward Antilles). They form the West Indies with the nearby Lucayan Archipelago (the Bahamas and Turks and Caicos Islands), which are considered to be part of the Caribbean despite not bordering the Caribbe ...
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Boula (music)
The word ''boula'' can refer to at least four different drums played in the Caribbean music area. Boula in the Caribbean In the Lesser Antilles region of the Caribbean, the boula drum is used in the big drum traditions. Carriacouan boula The ''boula'' of Carriacou is also a hand drum, now most often made of rum casks. It is also called the ''tambou dibas'', and is used in the big drum tradition. Grenadian boula In Grenada, a boula is a membranophone with an opened-bottom used in a big drum ceremony. Guadeloupean boula The Guadeloupean ''boula'' is a hand drum, similar to the '' tambou bèlè'', and is used in ''gwo ka'' and special occasions likes wakes, wrestling matches and Carnival celebrations. It is a hand drum that plays low-pitched sounds and is played single-handed and transversally. Haitian boula In the Greater Antilles of Haiti, the boula is in the same family as the Manman, Segon, and is the smallest of the three (7-8 inches in diameter and 18 – 24 inches ...
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Chantwell
Kaiso is folk music, and an important ancestor of calypso music. As early as the 1780s, the word kaiso was used to describe a French-based creole languages, French creole song and, in Trinidad, kaiso seems to have been perfected by the chantwells (singers, mostly female) during the first half of the 19th centurThe chantwells, assisted by alternating in call-and-response style with a chorus, were a central component of the practice called Calinda (stick-fighting). Calinda was a central component of early carnival celebrations in Trinidad, and after emancipation (1834), Afro-Creole peoples, Creoles essentially took over the streets during carnival. Elite French Creole revellers, for their part, moved their carnival celebrations indoors and to private parties. Kaiso used satirical and insulting lyrics, and is related to the picong tradition. Kaiso singers, called chantwells, sang primarily in French-based creole languages, French creole. Chantwells The "chantwell" is another incar ...
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Culturama
Each year, Nevisians celebrate their heritage during Culturama. It is Nevis' answer to the diverse range of carnivals enjoyed on other Caribbean islands. Held annually in late July/early August, it celebrates Nevisians who have moved away and returned to party with their friends and family. It is a commemoration and festival enjoying the cultural traditions. There's music Music is generally defined as the art of arranging sound to create some combination of form, harmony, melody, rhythm or otherwise expressive content. Exact definitions of music vary considerably around the world, though it is an aspe ... every night, parties, food festivals, and concerts, culminating in the early march through downtown Charlestown. The festival started in 1974. The idea of Culturama was conceived in February 1974 during a meeting of the Nevis Dramatic and Cultural Society (NEDACS).(July 31, 2006).Nevis' Summer Festival officially opens, SKNVibes.com News. Retrieved May 1, 2010. ...
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Fife (instrument)
A fife is a small, high-pitched, transverse aerophone, that is similar to the piccolo. The fife originated in medieval Europe and is often used in fife and drum corps, military units, and marching bands. Someone who plays the fife is called a fifer. The word ''fife'' comes from the German , meaning pipe, which comes from the Latin word . The fife is a diatonically tuned instrument commonly consisting of a tube with 6 finger holes and an embouchure hole that produces sound when blown across. Modern versions of the fife are chromatic, having 10 or 11 finger holes that allow any note to be played. On a 10-hole fife, the index, middle and ring fingers of both hands remain in the same positions as on the 6-hole fife, while both thumbs and both pinkies are used to play accidentals. An 11-hole fife has holes positioned similarly but adds a second hole under the right middle finger. Fifes are made primarily of wood, such as blackwood, grenadilla, rosewood, mopane, pink ivory, cocob ...
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Kettle Drum
Timpani (; ) or kettledrums (also informally called timps) are musical instruments in the percussion family. A type of drum categorised as a hemispherical drum, they consist of a membrane called a head stretched over a large bowl traditionally made of copper. Thus timpani are an example of kettle drums, also known as vessel drums and semispherical drums, whose body is similar to a section of a sphere whose cut conforms the head. Most modern timpani are ''pedal timpani'' and can be tuned quickly and accurately to specific pitches by skilled players through the use of a movable foot-pedal. They are played by striking the head with a specialized drum stick called a ''timpani stick'' or ''timpani mallet''. Timpani evolved from military drums to become a staple of the classical orchestra by the last third of the 18th century. Today, they are used in many types of ensembles, including concert bands, marching bands, orchestras, and even in some rock bands. ''Timpani'' is an Italian ...
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French-based Creole Languages
A French creole, or French-based creole language, is a creole for which French is the lexifier. Most often this lexifier is not modern French but rather a 17th- or 18th-century koiné of French from Paris, the French Atlantic harbors, and the nascent French colonies. This article also contains information on French pidgin languages, contact languages that lack native speakers. These contact languages are not to be confused with non-creole varieties of French outside of Europe that date to colonial times, such as Acadian, Louisiana, New England or Quebec French. There are over 15.5 million speakers of some form of based French based creole languages. Haitian Creole is the most spoken creole language in the world, with over 12 million speakers. History Throughout the 17th century, French Creoles became established as a unique ethnicity originating from the mix of French, Indian, and African cultures. These French Creoles held a distinct ethno-cultural identity, a shared anti ...
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Gwo Ka
Gwo ka is a French creole term for big drum. Alongside ''Gwotanbou'', simply ''Ka'' or ''Banboula'' (archaic), it refers to both a family of hand drums and the music played with them, which is a major part of Guadeloupean folk music. Moreover, the term is occasionally found in reference to the small, flat-bottomed tambourine (''tanbou d'bas'') played in kadri music, or even simply to drum (''tanbou'') in general. The Gwo Ka musical practice emerged in the seventeenth century, during the transatlantic slave trade Seven simple drum patterns form the basis of gwo ka music, on which the drummers build rhythmic improvisations. Different sizes of drums provide the foundation and its flourishes. The largest, the boula, plays the central rhythm while the smaller ''maké'' (or markeur) embellishes upon it, inter-playing with dancers, audience, or singer. Gwo ka singing is usually guttural, nasal, and rough, though it can also be bright and smooth, and is accompanied by upliftin ...
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Calinda
Calinda (also spelled kalinda or kalenda) is a martial art, as well as kind of folk music and war dance in the Caribbean which arose in the 1720s. It was brought to the Caribbean by Africans In the transatlantic slave trade and is based on native African combat dances. Calinda is the French spelling; the Spanish equivalent is ''calenda''. History Calinda is a kind of stick-fighting commonly seen practiced during Trinidad and Tobago Carnival.Shane K. Bernard and Julia Girouard, "'Colinda': Mysterious Origins of a Cajun Folksong," ''Journal of Folklore Research'' 29 (January–April 1992: 37–52. It is the national martial art of Trinidad and Tobago. French planters with their slaves, free coloureds and mulattos from neighboring islands of Grenada, Guadeloupe, Martinique and Dominica migrated to Trinidad during the Cedula of Population in 1783. Carnival had arrived with the French, and slaves who could not participate formed a parallel celebration (which eventually became kn ...
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