Jing Ping is a kind of folk music originated on the

slave Slavery and enslavement are both the state and the condition of being a slave—someone forbidden to quit one's service for an enslaver, and who is treated by the enslaver as property. Slavery typically involves slaves being made to perf ...

plantations of

Dominica Dominica ( or ; Kalinago: ; french: Dominique; Dominican Creole French: ), officially the Commonwealth of Dominica, is an island country in the Caribbean. The capital, Roseau, is located on the western side of the island. It is geographically ...

, also known colloquially as an accordion band. Dominican folk music, jing ping bands accompany a

circle dance Circle dance, or chain dance, is a style of social dance done in a circle, semicircle or a curved line to musical accompaniment, such as rhythm instruments and singing, and is a type of dance where anyone can join in without the need of part ...

called the flirtation, as well as the Dominican quadrille.

Origin

The Dominican quadrille generally has four figures, the ''pastouwèl'', ''lapoul'', ''lété'' and ''latrinitez''. Some regions of Dominica, such as

Petite Savanne Petite Savanne (French for "little savannah") was a village on the southeast side of Dominica. It had an estimated population of 1,200 in 2015. The region the town was built on features some of Dominica's steepest terrain; the slopes were composed ...

, are home to local variants such as the ''caristo''. Many quadrilles are found across Dominica under a wide variety of names. In addition to the standard quadrille, the

lancer A lancer was a type of cavalryman who fought with a lance. Lances were used for mounted warfare in Assyria as early as and subsequently by Persia, India, Egypt, China, Greece, and Rome. The weapon was widely used throughout Eurasia during the M ...

is also an important Dominican dance. Accompaniment for the quadrille is provided by a four instrument ensemble called a ''jing ping'' band. Jing ping bands are made up of a ''boumboum'' ( boom pipe), ''syak'' or ''gwaj'' (

scraper Scrape, scraper or scraping may refer to: Biology and medicine * Abrasion (medical), a type of injury * Scraper (biology), grazer-scraper, a water animal that feeds on stones and other substrates by grazing algae, microorganism and other matter ...

- rattle), ''tambal'' or ''tanbou'' (

tambourine The tambourine is a musical instrument in the percussion family consisting of a frame, often of wood or plastic, with pairs of small metal jingles, called "zills". Classically the term tambourine denotes an instrument with a drumhead, though ...

) and

accordion Accordions (from 19th-century German ''Akkordeon'', from ''Akkord''—"musical chord, concord of sounds") are a family of box-shaped musical instruments of the bellows-driven free-reed aerophone type (producing sound as air flows past a reed ...

. The

double bass The double bass (), also known simply as the bass () (or #Terminology, by other names), is the largest and lowest-pitched Bow (music), bowed (or plucked) string instrument in the modern orchestra, symphony orchestra (excluding unorthodox addit ...

violin The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...

banjo The banjo is a stringed instrument with a thin membrane stretched over a frame or cavity to form a resonator. The membrane is typically circular, and usually made of plastic, or occasionally animal skin. Early forms of the instrument were fashi ...

and

guitar The guitar is a fretted musical instrument that typically has six strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming or plucking the strings with the dominant hand, while simultaneously pressing selected stri ...

are also sometimes used. Bamboo flutes led the jing ping ensembles before the 1940s, when accordions were introduced. The Dominican flute tradition declined as a result, despite their additional use in

serenade In music, a serenade (; also sometimes called a serenata, from the Italian) is a musical composition or performance delivered in honor of someone or something. Serenades are typically calm, light pieces of music. The term comes from the Italian w ...

s, until being revived after the

National Independence Competitions National may refer to: Common uses * Nation or country ** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen Places in the United States * National, Maryland, ce ...

Instruments

The accordion band is the most popular ensemble of folk instruments on the island of Dominica. In recent times, it has been referred to as the Jing Ping band - the name being an onomatopoeia resembling the finely textured sound that is produced by this ensemble: * Primary Rhythmic Instrument (Tanbal) – It is the most important since the Tanbal player keeps the meter consistent for the other players to key directly from it. The Tanbal is a shallow drum with tightly stretched goatskin, held down by two or three wooden rings. * Bass Instrument (The Boom-Boom) – A hollowed wooden bwa kan or piece of bamboo. There is no mouthpiece but the playing end has a slant cut to enhance the sound. * Percussion (Gwaj or Siyak) – Has two parts; a cylinder measuring 3.5 inches in diameter and 10.5 inches length with holes like a grate in it. The cylinder also has gwen toloman (Canna Edules) or Jombi beads (Arbas precatorius). The other part is three 6-inch long wires of metal. It is played by shaking the cylinder and scrapping the metal stick against it. * Melodic Instrument (Accordion, Banjo, flutes or Violin) – The accordion is mostly used. The accordionist keeps the tunes and may improvise from time to time. He/she key according to the rhythm of the Tanbal player.

Jing ping in Contemporary music

Cadence-lypso

Cadence-lypso came from calypso from Trinidad and cadence rampa from Haiti, with influences from jing ping, the Dominican traditional music.

Bouyon

Bouyon legends

Windward Caribbean Kulture The WCK Band (Windward Caribbean Kulture) was formed in 1988 in Dominica.Thompson, Keith (2010) ''Caribbean Islands: The Land and The People'', New Africa Press, , p. 187 The band played a blend of the local Cadence-lypso and traditional Jing pi ...

(WCK) has played an important role in the development of Jing ping, giving credibility to a style that was seen as backward and unsophisticated. They began experimenting a fusion of

Cadence-lypso Cadence-lypso is a fusion of cadence rampa from Haiti and calypso from Trinidad and Tobago that has also spread to other English speaking countries of the Caribbean. Originated in the 1970s by the Dominican band Exile One on the island of Guad ...

and Jing ping.Sullivan, Lynne M. (2004) ''Adventure Guide to Dominica and St. Lucia'',
p. 49
Hunter Publishing,

Contemporary Jing ping

Contemporary Contemporary history, in English-language historiography, is a subset of modern history that describes the historical period from approximately 1945 to the present. Contemporary history is either a subset of the late modern period, or it is o ...

Jing ping is a modernized version of Jing ping, which utilizes modern instruments such as

drum set A drum kit (also called a drum set, trap set, or simply drums) is a collection of drums, cymbals, and other auxiliary percussion instruments set up to be played by one person. The player (drummer) typically holds a pair of matching drumsticks ...

, modern

synthesizer A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...

, and

electric bass The bass guitar, electric bass or simply bass (), is the lowest-pitched member of the string family. It is a plucked string instrument similar in appearance and construction to an electric or an acoustic guitar, but with a longer neck The ...

. It reflect a continuing trend to explore the jing ping sound and reproducing it using modern musical instruments and technolog

References

* {{cite web , url=http://www.avirtualdominica.com/music/bouyon.htm , title=Bouyon Music , work=Music in Dominica , accessdate=December 3, 2005 Dominica music