GRIOTS REPUBLIC - AN URBAN BLACK TRAVEL MAG - JULY 2016

GLOBAL MUSIC
Jason Rodgers
and the New
Sound of Atlanta
Orchestra Noir
Publishing Your
Travel Memoirs
Hola Morocha!
The Intersection
of Music, Sports
& Community
Uncle Luke
House Music
Takes Residence
in Mykonos
OSUNLADE
A Guide to the
Bajan Harvest
Festival
CROP OVER
Black Music
Andromeda to Zydeco
JULY 2016

ISSUE
CONTRIBUTORS

Archivists Note
“Music is a world within itself
With a language we all understand
With an equal opportunity
For all to sing, dance and clap their hands….”
– Steve Wonder, Songs in the Key of Life (1978)
Greetings Readers!
Music unites us all. No matter the creed or culture, music
can always be counted on to tell the stories of the day. It is
the barometer that measures the heart of a culture and the
angst and strength of the sub-cultures. With this in mind,
we present our issue on Global Music.
In this issue we got the chance to speak with musicians,
conductors, and vocalist from Reggae to Classical. You’ll
find their stories both heartwarming and inspiring. Conductor
and musician Jason Rodgers (#1) will have you
smiling as he recalls chasing his music teacher down as a
kid. You may be super engrossed in the history of Zydeco
(#2) as written by Folklorist Barry Ancelet and Diana Ogilvie’s
summation of modern Marijuana Tourism (#3) will
have you bugging. Who knew?
Lastly, if you read nothing else, then check out Lynnée
Denise’s article on House DJ Osunlade. His residency
in Mykonos could not be at a doper location. House
music from a premier DJ at Scorpios? Seriously...
we’re booking tickets soon.
Oh, and did we mention we caught up with
Uncle Luke?
The writers and contributors in this
issue have out done themselves and
we’re excited to present their work
to you. As always, thank you for
reading!
WE NEED YOUR OPINION
SURVEY
We want to know how to
serve you better.
bit.ly/GRMAGSURVEY
An Urban Black
Travel Mag
T H E A R C H I V I S T S

R E A D I N G L I S T
GOT THE WHOLE
WORLD READING
By Rodney Goode
Arguably, growing up a black man in
America is one of the most difficult
journeys one could undertake. Who
has not heard that the odds are powerfully
against a black man surviving to the age of
25? Or what about the odds that if he does,
he will be incarcerated?
READ
in the street?
How does one cope with mental illness when
it still is a hard discussion in the black
community?
How do the influences of
gods among men like
Lebron, Obama,
Malcom, and
Chapelle
In Invisible Man, Got the Whole World
Watching, Mychal Denzel Smith manages
to reach into his black, millennial psyche,
extract both the good and the not so good
and help his readers make sense of it all
(or not). After all, how does one reconcile
(without help) living in an age where there is
a black president but those sworn to serve
and protect callously murder men of color
shape
a black
man?
As one moves through
the pages of Invisible Man,
it becomes instantly clear to the
reader, that these questions plague(ed)
Smith to the point where he had to write
this memoir. He had to somehow free these
thoughts, no doubt to make room for more.
Smith, uses his perspective on both the historical
and cultural events of his lifetime to
explore the identity of the black man and
his role in the future of the black community.
The pages of Invisible Man are full of
insight, anger, pain and a myriad of other
emotions and once immersed in this journey
with Smith, the reader will either be perplexed
by it all or feel like Smith stole their
thoughts and put them on paper. Either way,
the reader may never be the same.
Smith not only makes the invisible seen,
his thoughts resonate long after his book
is placed on your shelf. It’s reminiscent of
looking at the sun and after turning away
and closing your eyes, still seeing the image
Black Educators, take note: Consider making
this book part of your reading curriculum.
Griots Republic gives this
book 5 out of 5 stamps.

G L OC BO AM L MGU INF IT TS
Y
S O C I A L M E D I A
FIELD NOTES
IG PHOTO OF THE MONTH
The Intersection of Music,
Sports & the Black Community
We caught up with Luther Campbell, aka Uncle Luke, from the notorious
Two Live Crew, while his team was competing in the First
Annual Duke Johnson High School Football 7 on 7 challenge in Miami.
Check out what he and other professional players had to say
about giving back to the community.
By Wayne Farquharson (@I_MWayne)
Having been recently introduced to art
and the enjoyment of museum going,
you would think that my favorite piece
would be a Lebrun or a Monet, but instead,
down a quiet hallway and to the right, I came
across what initially appeared to be a relatively
mundane courtyard at The Palace de Versailles.
Upon further inspection, I noticed the
perfect color contrasts between the textured
stair landings and the runners, which makes
each step more pronounced. The stone railings
with the marbling clearly visible provides
depth and the weathered gargoyles, which
appear to have been bronze but oxidized to
a light green create a boundary that directs
your sightlines to the stairs, where the aforementioned
texture was captured.
Of the over 1000 photos taken in Paris, this by
far, is my favorite for it shows how beauty can
be found by simply looking for and appreciating
the details.
Place #GriotsRepublic on your IG photos and you too may be chosen.

L I T T L E P A S S P O R T S
EXPOSURE!
Summer Travel Adds Capital to the School Bank
By Dr. Miah E. Daughtery
As summer days stretch into summer
nights, one way to ensure students are
prepared for the next school year is by
exploring a foreign land. Research has shown
that the summer months are critical for student
academic growth. Summer vacations with extended
learning for children and teenagers are
correlated with academic success. Rich travel
experiences equate to exposure to different
languages, cultures, foods, and people. These
experiences--termed cultural and social capital--act
as a savings account that students continue
to draw from during their academic careers.
Cultural and social capital are linked to higher
academic achievement. Cultural capital equals
non-financial assets like skills, talents, tastes,
clothing, material belongs, and credentials that
advance social standing. Consider a student
who visits Costa Rica with his parents during
the summer. The family may take day trips to
the Volcan Arenal volcano and the Parque Nacional
Manuel Antonio, learn to order casado or
arroz con camarones, and see a Spanish performance
at the Teatro Nacional de Costa Rica.
At the volcano, the student learns about the
history of the country’s most active volcano
and eruptions. In the park, the student closely
observes rainforest life and biodiversity. Sleepy,
slow moving sloths, brightly-colored toucans,
iguanas, and monkeys populate the park while
an educated guide with a telescope points out
various animals and plants and provides background
of each. The student learns quickly
that a dish of rice and beans is called gallo pinto
and picks up sayings that allow interactions
with locals.
At the Teatro Nacional de Costa Rica, the student
watches a performance of Sueno de una
noche de verano--an adaptation of William
Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
In a week, a student could feasibly experience
Costa Rica from a cultural, linguistic, and social
perspective, each interaction a deposit into
the bank of cultural capital.
Cultural capital is not the only capital students
accrue while traveling; during visits to foreign
lands, ripe and ample opportunities to build social
capital are available as well. Social capital
is the collection of networks and relationships;
the stronger, more diverse the network, the more
social capital one has. In the U.S., social capital
can be easily identified in organizations like
Jack and Jill or Greek-lettered organizations. As
students engage in network-broadening interactions,
they benefit.
Traveling is an easy way to
naturally broaden students’
networks. When students
leave their neighborhoods,
they meet other young
people who speak a different
language, eat different
foods, engage in different
sports activities, and have
different family structures.
These relationships build a
sense of cultural and personal
awareness which they
bring back to the classroom.
Capital pays off in the classroom.
In biology, the student
carries the experiences
of the Costa Rican rainforest. The student
interacts more easily in Spanish, because of
the authentic opportunities to speak the language
with Costa Ricans. When reading A Midsummer
Night’s Dream in English, the student
visualizes scenes from the theater, improving
comprehension. Throughout the school year,
parents and students maintain healthy and
positive relationships with summer families by
connecting through Facebook. These relationships
could blossom into student exchange opportunities,
thus broadening cultural networks.
Prior to embarking on adventure, parents can
build high interest while promoting activities
that directly impact the classroom. With adult
support, students--even as young as kindergarten--should
engage in a webquest about the
country, searching for interesting facts, words,
phrases, art, and culture. Students should help
plan the traveling experience by working with
parents to determine “must sees” and “must
dos” based off of their research.
Students should identify one aspect of the culture
they find most compelling and engage in
extended research around that one idea. For
example, a student interested in food can cook
a variety of recipes of the
country before the visit
and read interesting articles
about the country’s
foods and diet. During
the visit, the student
could sample two or three
recipes in the native land.
Traveling and exposure
should include your little-
-and not-so-little--ones.
The summer months
are meant for continued
learning, and traveling
can ensure that learning
takes place. Social and
cultural capital deposits
in your child’s school
bank can be withdrawn in
the classroom and benefits
pay off for years to come.
Miah Daughtery, Ed.D has been an
educator for fifteen years, primarily reading
and English for all grades 6-12. She is
currently the Coordinator of K-12 Literacy
for the Tennessee Department of Education.
When she’s not thinking about issues
around equity, access, and literacy, she is
most likely baking phenomenal chocolate
chip cookies, brunching, wine-tasting, or
traveling. Follow her on Twitter at DST6N01
for information on all things literacy.

G L O B A L G I F T S
ALL ABOUT
THAT BASS
By Alexandra Stewart
We are now in the full swing of summer
– the kids are officially out of school,
family reunions and weekend cookouts
are in full effect. We are also in
the height of vacation season for those
living in the U.S. and summer tunes are
at the center of it all. So I’m keeping
in line with all things “MUSIC” this issue
and hipping you to some really cool
portable options for listening to your
favorite tunes while you’re on the go!
Chant Bluetooth
Portable Audio System
“Chant Down Babylon” has never
sounded better coming from a
portable speaker! Straight from
The House of Marley brand, you
simply can’t go wrong when it
comes to style, eco-friendliness
and quality. Get up to 8 hours of
continuous play. Perfect for any
excursion, foreign or domestic. -
$79.99
www.thehouseofmarley.com
Bose SoundSport
In-Ear Headphones
Not only are these Bose ear buds sweat
and weather-resistant,they are made
in 3 different sizes that will conform
to the shape of your ear so that
they comfortably stay in place! And
there’s really no need to
talk about the sound
quality... because Bose.
Comes in a variety of
colors - $99.00
www.amazon.com
Ivation Bullet Super-Portable
Rechargeable Bluetooth Speaker
If you love to bike ride then this portable speaker
is for you. It’s very light-weight and comes with
mounting straps to attach the speaker to your
handlebars. It allows you to play music from diverse
sources using either Bluetooth, a micro SD card or
AUX line. Speaker includes 4 different colored skins
and mounting straps. - $29.99 www.amazon.com
FlipBelt Zipper
When you are on the run (literally)
this belt is just the thing to keep
your precious tunes safe and in
place. The large secure zipper pocket
can hold everything from your
passport to your smartphone. The
belt has moisture wicking and quick
drying capabilities and comes in a
variety of sizes and colors. - $34.99
www.flipbelt.com
Pantheon Waterproof Mini Cube
Bluetooth Speaker
The best thing about this speaker is
that it is completely waterproof
and can be submerged in up to 5
ft. of water. It’s super compact
and can easily fit in your
pocket, thus you can take
it wherever you go! The universal
Bluetooth compatibility
allows you to connect effortlessly
to everything from Motorola to
iPhone to Android. Don’t sleep. -
$21.99 www.amazon.com

01 TONY
REBEL
TRAVELER PROFILE
Patrick George Anthony Barrett, better known
by his stage name Tony Rebel, is a Jamaican
reggae deejay.
Born in Manchester Parish, Jamaica, Barrett
was initially a singer, appearing as Papa Tony
or Tony Ranking in local talent contests and on
sound systems including Sugar Minott’s ‘Youth
Promotion’. His first release was the single
“Casino” that appeared in 1988 on the MGB
record label, although his career took off when
he worked with Donovan Germain’s Penthouse
setup in the early 1990s. He had a big hit in
1990 with “Fresh Vegetable”, and established a
singjay style of delivery.
In 1992 he signed a deal with Columbia Records
who released Vibes of the Times, a predominantly
reggae fusion album, the following year.
It spawned some of his more well known international
singles such as the title track “Vibes of
the Times” and “Nazerite Vow” both of which
had accompanying music videos. In 1994 he
founded his record label, ‘Flames’. That same
year, he held a reggae festival named Rebel Salute
in Mandeville, Jamaica. It has developed
into an annual event through his production
company, Flames Productions, and is held every
year on his birthday.
PHOTO CREDIT: RED BULL MUSIC

THE
DRUM
BY JULEON LEWIS
What is ‘global black music?’ When I
heard the topic, I didn’t even know
how to speak to it. After all, when
I travel the globe, Drake’s latest emotional
lament or the shrill sounds of “Single
Ladies” have dominated nightclubs and
pop up parties from Peru to Phuket. [Easy,
bey-hive; easy, young money millionaires;
your sheeple is showing.] And while many
non-Americans (also) think of ‘black music’
and aspire to whip it and nae-nae like
a venerable trap queen, ‘global black music’
is far more than the refuse usually
pumped through the radio.
So, how do we discover and discuss global
black music? Even I, a 29 year-old black
male who listens and dances to everything
from semba to salsa; kompa to kizomba;
and techno to trap, had difficulty finding a
place to start. Thankfully, after a few days
of thought and (of course) a bit of musical
inspiration, it hit me. ‘global black music’
isn’t a vague idea that we need to struggle
to define - ‘black’ music is imbued with the
strength, joy, and resilience of our people.
It’s what’s been used to communicate
messages across miles of terrain, what’s
been used to record history, what we move
to when we’re happy, what gets us ready
for a hunt or what gives us the courage to
ask someone to dance. Global black music
is pumped throughout the world with the
heartbeat of our homeland! The heartbeat
of the motherland can be heard in every
song and all one needs to do to find it, is
to hear the beat of the drum.
Now, it may be a bit hard for even younger
generations to understand, but before
the hard-hitting baselines and synthesized

eats of today existed, music was played
with *gasp* actual instruments! While
time continues to show us that with only
a few instruments, an innumerable array
of songs and melodies can be composed,
one common thread among most black
music is the drum.
So how did our music become global and
how has our rhythm impacted nearly all
other genres of music? Simple. The answers
lie in the largest migration of people
from the continent of Africa - ever - the
slave trade. While most American history
books (at least, the ones that still discuss
the facts of slavery) touch on slave routes
and its impact on the creation of America
as we know it, it’s rarely communicated
or discussed that over the course of three
centuries, over 12.5 million Africans were
taken as slaves. Of the roughly 10.5 that actually
survived the inhumane journey, only
around 6% of those Africans were taken to
North America. The rest? The Caribbean,
Central America, and South America.
Across the vast and unforgiving waters of
the Atlantic those millions of black bodies
didn’t come alone; they carried with them
the soul of our homeland. The soul can be

felt in every song through every era. All one
needs to do to find it, is to feel the beat of
the drum.
While a heartbeat sustains life and passion
is produced from the soul, our human body
contains the heart and the soul. Through
this flesh, our heart and our passion express
themselves to the rest of the world.
So although we became divided, our soul
and heartbeat would just find opportunity
to endure longer and beat louder.
From West Africa, the Yoruba, Igbo, Ashanti,
and other groups native to Ghana, Benin,
Guinea and more were brought over.
Accompanying them, the Bantu people
(primarily from Angloa, Mozambique, and
the Congo region) soon made the voyage.
Brazil, Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela
soon became home to roughly 50% of all
slaves brought over. The remaining 50%
went to the Caribbean and North America.
Although we were tired, beaten, broken,
and mourning and although native singing
and dancing was largely outlawed, our
strength and our hope was as unbroken as
the rhythm of the djembe and the dunun
that you could soon hear secretly escaping
into the night.
From the Kokosawa drumming group to
the Gahu drumming groups, over time our
music began to leak out in pockets. In the
late 1800’s and early 1900’s, after slavery
as we knew it was largely abolished, our
music had been altered and influenced by
those native to the Americas, the Spanish,
Portuguese, and Europeans. However, anybody
that feels and hears our music knows
that it’s identifiably ours.
You can hear it in the conga drums that
are now popular throughout the world, but
were birthed in Cuba. These very congas
are simply modernized “ngomas drums,”
which are traditional Congolese drums,
and are the undercurrent
of ‘Son’
music (and dance),
widely considered
the parent of hugely-popular
salsa
music.
When they took
away the drums,
our people made
drums out of empty
fish crates. Today
this instrument,
called a cahon, is a primary element
of Afro-cuban Rumba and can be heard
played in Cuba and along the Peruvian and
Colombian shores. However, it wasn’t just
descendants of the Bantu that contributed
to the instruments, music, and the
dance of black music, for birthed in the
belly of the double-sided Yoruban batá,
Cumbia began spreading from Colombia
and throughout the rest of Latin America
around the 1940s.
From east to west our
hearts and bodies
were taken, but the
separation didn’t
break us; it made our
drum beat louder.
When they took away our drums, our brothers
in the Dominican Republic fashioned
double-sided drums out of empty wine
barrels. These drums were called Tamboras
and are used heavily in merengue music
which is very popular in the Caribbean.
From the carimbó drum, which is also a
popular dance in Brazil (also called carimbó),
we learn of the batuque music and
dance from cape verde.
While this piece could go further to discuss
the trail blazed by the drum that lead
to additional impacts on the global music
scene, including soca, calypso, jazz, kompa,
blues, disco and soul, funk, rap, hiphop,
reggae, rock & roll, house, and many
other genres, it’s more conclusive to say
that we have become the beat of the drum.
From east to west
our hearts and
bodies were taken,
but the separation
didn’t break
us; it made our
drum beat louder.
When drums were
abolished (as they
were in Trinidad in
the late 1880s),
we overcame and
made steel drums.
At every opportunity
our people have overcome, and I think
you can feel that in the music.
You see, studying global black music is
studying global black history and one can’t
separate our history, the thing that unites
us together as a people and that unites us
with the earth we live on, from the drum.
Whether your ancestors were carried to
Brazil or Barbados, Panama, Puerto Rico,
or Jamaica, our music isn’t hard to find.
Take a deep breath and pause, feel, and
listen. The drum is in you.

TOTAL
PRAISE
GOSPEL MUSIC FINDS A HOME
FROM HARLEM TO ST. PETERSBURG
Juleon Lewis has been traveling the
world for months at a time for the
past two years. From Mexico to Chile
to Indonesia he has enjoyed fulfilling
his passion of traveling. For tips on
the best places to go, follow his
adventures on his blog at
www.travelhustlertintl.com.
By Raquel Wanzo

HARLEM GOSPEL
CHOIR
© Tiphany Overzat
OSLO GOSPEL
CHOIR
© Tiphany Overzat
Wade in the Water
Wade in the Water,
Children
Wade in the Water
God’s gonna
trouble the water.
~19th century Negro spiritual
The lyrics above are known all
around the world. They’ve been
recorded by everyone from the
Fisk Jubilee Singers, who were the first
known singing group to record Wade in
the Water, to Blues Legend Big Momma
Thorton, the noted multi-genre
singer, Bob Dylan and the jazz great
Ramsey Lewis and the Ramsey Lewis
Trio. This Negro spiritual and several
other songs like it, including City Called
Heaven, Steal Away to Jesus and Soon
Ah Will be Done, are all the beginnings
of the legacy of gospel music.
Gospel music is born out of the spiritual
and blues tradition. The impact
of the traditional Negro spiritual cannot
be understated considering many
of the songs mentioned above have
been recorded by various artists from
various genres under the guise of the
gospel tradition. It is the essence of
the African American oral tradition.
For the Negro spiritual is not simply
about the praise, reverence and worship
to Jesus or God; it is also about
a longing to be free and the journey
it takes to get there. For example,
‘Wade in the Water’ is advising slaves
who are escaping bondage how to trek
through the water to make their way to
freedom.
These songs were sung a capella or
without music; just the syncopated
rhythm provided by the voices and
hand claps (in church or during celebrations)
by the slaves themselves.
The musical presentation is probably
the biggest distinction between the
Negro spiritual and gospel music. For
just as the spirituals provided hope
and guidance, so does gospel music.
Like the traditional Negro hymns, gospel
lyrics are born out of the Christian
context and further communicate not
just messages of spiritual hope but
also perseverance. Gospel music is
born out of the blues and jazz tradition.
Probably the most famous blues
musician and writer to define early
gospel is Thomas A. Dorsey.
Dorsey’s genius was in combining elements
of his musical education, the
Chicago sound and lyric writing ability
to produce songs that not only spoke
to the soul lyrically but also rhythmically.
His most famous song is Take
my Hand, Precious Lord and was writ-

SOWETO GOSPEL
CHOIR
COUNTRY GOSPEL
CHOIR (ENGLAND)
ST. PETERSBURG
GOSPEL CHOIR
KOREAN HERITAGE
MASS CHOIR
(DOCUMENTARY)

ten out of Dorsey’s despair over the
death of his wife, Nettie, in childbirth.
The song is a haunting confession of
grief’s simultaneous feeling of fatigue
and hope. It has been published in over
40 languages and sung by artists such
as Nina Simone, Elvis Presley, Aretha
Franklin and Beyonce. Its continued
popularity and global appeal speaks
to the strength of gospel music internationally.
International
reception of the
African American
spiritual genre
has always been
generous.
Gospel music has long had global appeal.
International reception of the
African American spiritual genre has
always been generous. In the late
nineteenth century and the early twentieth
century, early gospel quartets like
the Fisk Jubilee Singers and Orpheus
McAdoo’s Virginia Jubilee Singers had
success in South Africa with McAdoo’s
group performing there for a five years;
but they also traveled to other parts of
the world like England, Australia and
India. In the 50’s and 60’s artists like
Mahalia Jackson and the Clara Ward
Singers performed in Europe and Vietnam.
At the end of the 60s, there was a shift
in the traditional gospel sound to the
more contemporary gospel sound,
which features more of a rhythmic section
with drums and bass tones. Edwin
Hawkins is considered one of the pioneers
of this modern genre of gospel.
His song, Oh Happy Day, reached not
only national success but also global
success. In 1969, it reached number
1 on the charts in Europe. This song
has been published in several languages
and like Dorsey’s Take My Hand
Precious Lord, has been recorded by
several artists here in the states and
overseas. Hawkins’ success garnered
success for others like Gospel Music
Workshop of America, Shirley Caesar
and internationally awarded James
Cleveland, whose success overseas began
in the 60s and continued until his
death.
The appeal of gospel music continues
to grow overseas. Gospel artists are
performing in Africa, Australia, across
Europe and Asia. Performers like Donnie
McClurkin, Fred Hammond, Israel
Houghton and Kirk Franklin perform
abroad. The secret of success of gospel
music is really no secret at all. The
music has universal appeal. The spirit-filled
messages of hope, resolve and
worship transcend race and nationality.
McClurkin in the 2011 article, “Face of
Gospel Music No Longer Just Black or
American,” is quoted as saying “Gospel
music is not black and not American.
It is global... there are so many different
genres of gospel music. There are
so many cultures that make up gospel
music. The thing about gospel music is
that its message stays the same even
though the music changes with the
times.” McClurkin’s point underscores
the evolution of gospel: whether in the
States or abroad, it’s clear the inspirational
musical messages are here to
stay.
JUBILATION GOSPEL
CHOIR (ITALY)
Raquel Wanzo is a native of
the Bay Area. She is a writer,
lover of poetry and black
history and currently, she is
a part-time English Professor
at Laney College in Oakland,
California.

CROP
OVER
Do not psyche yourself
out by assuming that
you need to be built like
Ciara or Cam Newton...
A First Timer's Unofficial Guide to
the Bajan Harvest Festival
By Lincoln Blades
It was April 1996 and I was a seventh-grader
sitting in geography class,
anxiously waiting for my turn to participate
in our class assignment. Our teacher
had asked us each to draw the flag of the
country that represents our family’s heritage,
and I was excited as hell because I
knew that my flag would be one that no
one else in the class (hell, no one else in
the entire school) could claim. As we went
around the room, our teacher finally got to
me and said, “Lincoln, where is your family
from?”
“Barbados!” I quickly replied, with a beaming
smile and a large sense of pride.
Her response: “Oh? Which part of Jamaica
is that?”
Twenty years ago, there wasn’t much
knowledge or recognition of the multifaceted
beauty and historical significance of
the West Indies as a whole. Our very different
regional accents were collectively regarded
as Jamaican patois, and the only
times many first-world folks even realized
there were uniquely separate islands with
divergent backgrounds was either when
they were planning their Caribbean honeymoon
or when they were listening to the
Beach Boys’ “Kokomo.”
But, in just two decades, thanks to the
advent of the internet and the popularity
of social media, not only do people know

about the existence of all of our different
islands from Anguilla to Turks &
Caicos, but they also now know about
the individual cultural experiences that
make each separate island a remarkable
and unmistakable destination.
For many islands, socially and economically
speaking, carnival is the unequivocally
large attraction that lures
visitors from all around the globe.
You better get yourself
an expertly made
Cockspur Rum Punch
or any Mount Gay mix
you can find.
The popularity of celebrations such
as the Trinidad & Tobago Carnival,
Spicemas in Grenada and Crop Over
in Barbados, has spawned a sprawling
cultivation of Caribbean carnival
culture in places where, to be honest,
I didn’t even know enough West Indians
lived to justify any kind of parade
or festival. Now, there are carnivals in
rather unexpected American cities like
Columbia, SC, Worcester, MA, Dallas,
TX, Hartford, CT and Minnesota - yes,
Minne-frostbite-sota. Go to Google
right now and type in your city, and
there’s a good chance you’ll find a carnival
going down close by.
The popularity of these small festivals
is nothing short of amazing. It is
beautiful to see people from all different
walks of life openly celebrating our
culture. To go from people not knowing
anything about my island, to them
viewing it as a first-class destination
that they must visit to “jump up” is
heart warming. But, while people lose
themselves in euphoria at their local
celebrations, there are a couple things
you need to know before you hop on
a plane and decide to take part in the
larger, island celebration. I want you
to have fun without wasting your hardearned
money or making a fool of
yourself.
Historically, “Crop Over” literally
marked the end of crop season, the harvesting
of sugarcane. It is a uniquely Barbadian
festival that started during the
colonial period and celebrations involved
music and dancing- still mainstay to present
crop overs. Since I’m Bajan, here are
some unofficial tips you need to know before
attending Crop Over.
WHETHER YOU HAVE A
6-PACK OR A KEG,
PLAY MAS
While “Crop Over” is the name of the entire
celebration, Grand Kadooment or “Kadooment
Day” is the actual parade where
the beautiful costumes are put on full display.
Do not psyche yourself out by assuming
that you need to be built like Ciara
or Cam Newton (whose jersey number, 1,
represents his entire body-fat percentage)
to rock one of the costumes in the street.
Believe it or not, the constant puritanical
body shaming, that many of us have grown
accustomed to elsewhere, is definitely not
prevalent in the West Indies when it comes
to playing Mas. It’s about having a great
costume and having a great time. Everyone
is there to lose himself or herself in
the vibe, and the best way for you to do
that is not as a spectator, but as a full participant.
Oh, and WEAR COMFORTABLE SHOES.

DRINK BAJAN RUM
It’s the BEST in the world (yes, I said BEST).
Listen, don’t you come all the way to Barbados
to ask for the same alcohol you buy
at the liquor store near your house or request
the same cocktail you get at the frowsy
lounge you frequent. Barbados makes
the best rum on Earth (fight me!), which
means you better get yourself an expertly
made Cockspur Rum Punch or any Mount
Gay mix you can find.
EAT BAJAN FOOD
As much as I love KFC and Chefette (our
local fast food spot), do not fly all the way
to the gorgeous island to live off of a fried
chicken and fries diet, which you can obviously
get back home. Make sure you have
some bakes, fish cakes and flying fish. In
fact, make sure you head down Oistins in
Christ Church on a Friday night and enjoy
the fish fry. It’s Bajan food at its finest. Also,
make sure you get up bright and early on a
Saturday morning and find yourself a good
spot to eat some black pudding and souse.
PLAN YOUR PARTY SCHEDULE
WELL IN ADVANCE
In the words of Aubrey Graham, if you’re
reading this it’s too late. Ok, it’s not completely
too late, but some really great parties
have already sold out, so if you’re interested
in enjoying all that the party scene
has to offer, hop online and purchase tickets
asap. There are dockside boat parties,
there are boat cruises, there are nightclub
parties, there are day parties, and there
are even breakfast parties. Don’t plan on
sleeping - you can do that in your cubicle
when you get back home.
LEARN THE HISTORY
This is not me saying that you must bury
your head in books and cram like you’re
trying to pass your SATs. It’s just about being
able to acknowledge the context behind
everything that you’re seeing. Learn about
the bands, the artists and the people. Think
about it like this: you can watch and enjoy
Hamilton without knowing anything about
American history, but if you have some
clue about it, you will enjoy the production
a lot more.
MIND YOURSELF
The worst mistake you can make is confusing
Crop Over for Spring Break, and Barbados
for a raucous South Beach mansion
for drunk, unmannerly college kids. Bajans
know how to have an awesome time, but
we’re also a tiny but strong, prideful, and
God-fearing nation. If you’ve never experienced
an authentic island carnival, that
might seem oxymoronic to you. But don’t
let the way people are dressed and the way
people are dancing confuse you into thinking
you’re on a Hedonism resort. This is not
the place for musty behaviour and slackness,
but it’s the best venue in the world
to completely lose yourself in great music,
great food and great people.
The only warning I will give you is this: you
will have such an amazing time; it’s gonna
be hard to enjoy your local festival the
same way. In fact, you may come down with
a condition called ‘carnival tablanca’ which
is essentially festival withdrawal symptom,
making you pine for the next big carnival
to occur so you can wukk-up yourself. And
if you’re on a budget like I am, get used to
uttering this phrase while you wait for next
year’s Crop Over:
“See, the way my bank account is set up...”
When Lincoln Anthony Blades is not writing
for his controversial and critically acclaimed
blog ThisIsYourConscience.com, he can
be found contributing articles for many
different publications on topics such as race,
politics, social reform and relationships.
Lincoln is an author who wrote the hilariously
insightful book “You’re Not A Victim, You’re
A Volunteer.” He is also the host of the
upcoming news show, All Things Being
Equal.

JASON
RODGERS
02TRAVELER PROFILE
Maestro Rodgers is currently the Founder
and Music Director of Orchestra Noir, the
Atlanta African-American Orchestra.
Jason has appeared with many exceptional
orchestras in the U.S. and abroad and in
August of 2015 Maestro Rodgers was
awarded first prize in the London Classical
Soloists Competition and will be joining
them in concert during their 2016
European tour.
In 2014 Maestro Rodgers was also named
winner of the International Conducting
Competition held in Atlanta, GA and first
prize winner of the conducting competition
awarded by the Orchestra da Camera
Fiorentina in Florence, Italy. These
prestigious accolades have resulted in guest
appearances in North America and abroad,
making his European debut in 2014 with
the Orchestra Di Toscana Classica.
For more information about Jason Rodgers,
visit his website at jasonikeemrodgers.com.
For more information about Orchestra Noir,
go to www.orchestranoir.com.

BLESS THE
DECKS
Osunlade and Yoruba Records launches
“Rituals” Residency in Mykonos, Greece
By Lynnée Denise
PHOTO CREDIT: RED BULL MUSIC

As a DJ, I’ve traveled to three different
continents in search of evidence of
the fact that house music is a form
of global black music, or what I call, electronic
music of the African diaspora. As
a Californian native, my relationship to
house music was limited, it wasn’t in regular
rotation of California 1980s’ black radio
nor was it played in my home. Part of
the reason for this is because house music’s
early development is linked to migration
patterns.
Chicago and Detroit,
two of the most popular
great migration
destination sites, are
the cities where the
music was first produced
by its founding
artists, many of whom
traveled regularly to
New York gay clubs.
DJs-turned-producers
created a sound that
can be described as
the space between
Saturday night club
culture and Sunday
morning church. This
means that house music has black southern
gospel and New York queer-oriented
disco roots.
At the core of house music is a pulsating
vibration that can be likened to a heartbeat.
The pulse, also known as the ‘four
to the floor” beat situates house music
in a diasporic context. Brown folks from
places like Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the Dominican
Republic, and who were also part
of the NYC disco scene, can be credited
with bringing regional rhythms like salsa,
merengue and even music associated with
Santeria, to the sound of house music as
well.
This layered origin story of house music explains
why I traveled to attend the premier
of Yoruba Records residency launch party
in Mykonos, Greece. Club Scorpios, where
the “Rituals” residency will be hosted from
June until September, was stunning and
curiously posh which inspired questions
about Greece’s declining economy and its
tourist industry in response to it. The venue
overlooks the Aegean Sea, serves designer
cocktails whilst you sip surrounded
by Moroccan décor. Walk a few steps away
from the bar and you’ll find yourself outside
on the dance
floor, under the
moon.
At the core of house
music is a pulsating
vibration that can
be likened to a
heartbeat. The pulse,
also known as the
‘four to the floor” beat
situates house music
in a diasporic context.
I traveled to Greece
to hear DJ and producer
Osunlade
‘bless the decks,’
with his special
soulful-afro-techy
touch. Osunlade
has been based in
Santorini, Greece
for the past ten
years and is the
founder of Yoruba
Records.
I had a chance to chat with Osunlade, a
black expatriate and St. Louis native, and
we discussed his connection to house music
as a practicing Ifa priest and his life
in Europe. When asked about the relationship
between house music and African traditional
spiritual practices, he referenced
the heartbeat and of course the trancelike
percussive rhythms that drive the music
and guide those who surrender themselves
to it.
One of the most interesting parts of our
conversation was his response to my question
about the impact of Prince’s death on

lack music—he’s a huge fan of Prince,
so I knew to ask. He spoke about learning
from Prince’s business model. Osunlade
felt the exploitive and oppressive nature of
the music business and wanted to protect
his creative process and protect his profit.
He decided to no longer work under the
influences of corporate ideals and started
his independent label, Yoruba in 1999 (no
pun intended).
The venue overlooks
the Aegean Sea,
serves designer
cocktails whilst you
sip surrounded by
Moroccan décor.
Through the process of becoming independent
he found Ifa, which he defines as
an ancestral based culture/religion based
on nature, deriving from the Yoruba people
of West Africa (Nigeria) and practiced
by the enslaved Africans during the forced
dispersion to the Americas.
Osunlade’s sound also reflects his childhood
Midwest experience where there was
full access to jazz, blues and variations of
soul. I was excited to learn more about his
work as he invited me to his temporary
home (really a compound), provided by
the club for his guests who will fly in from
around the world to spin at the residency.
When we pulled up at two in the morning,
Osunlade was outside collecting lavender
to make oil for close friends that he’ll share
as he travels. He offered us fresh ginger
tea and gave a quick tour of the villa. He
pointed out the healer’s quarter, as tarot
card readers and reiki workers are part of
the residency as well. He then showed us
the recording studio and the live DJ set up
to be available for guests.
Yoruba records, headquartered in Greece,
is a refreshing break from the formulaic
pop music we can’t escape in America, or
worldwide for that matter. Find the music
of Osunlade and Yoruba Records if you are
open to a more intentional and intimate
relationship with music that transcends
borders in all forms.

Lynnée Denise is a DJ whose
work is informed and inspired by
underground cultural movements,
the 1980s, migration studies,
theories of escape, and electronic
music of the African Diaspora.
Beyond the dance floor, her work
provides “Entertainment with a
Thesis.” Visit her blog at www.
djlynneedenise.com for more
information.

GRIME
Written By Jendella Benson
I
was sixteen, two years too young to
be fighting my way through the tangled
and sweaty mass of bodies that
filled the club, but I was there nonetheless.
When I finally managed to stumble
to the bar, I croaked out an order for a
large glass of cold water before collapsing
on the countertop. My limbs were
dead and aching, my throat was like
sandpaper, and my head felt light and
fragile after hours of non-stop dancing.
Through the stabs of pain I heard the DJ
switch tracks and I recognised the song
immediately. Before the bassline had a
chance to drop, I had bulldozed my way
back to the dance floor. All physical discomfort
and functional needs were forgotten,
my glass of cold water was left
untouched on the bar where my head
had lain.
That’s what Grime did to me then, and
to be honest it still has that effect now.
In fact, play ‘Oi!’ by More Fire Crew at
the wedding reception of the average
twenty-something Black British couple
and witness another level of “turn up”.
The infectious energy, trance-inducing
basslines, and gritty subject matter
is often seen as intimidating to more
– ahem – mainstream audiences, and
some club owners have even banned
Grime from their establishments, but
then what else is new? Grime was made
in the margins for the marginalised.
Grime is us.
The genre came from east London,
economically one of the poorest areas
of the UK. It was birthed around the
time when the British tabloids were in
www.GriotsRepublic.com

full panic mode about gangs of black
boys running the streets of Britain killing
each other. The Operation Trident
initiative, launched by London’s Metropolitan
Police to tackle gun crime and
homicide in the black community, was
introducing a new level of harassment
and surveillance to the lives of young
black men everywhere. My hometown of
Birmingham was experiencing its own
moral panic, after a drive by shooting
resulted in the deaths of Charlene Ellis
and Letisha Shakespeare, and brought
the city’s gang rivalries to the forefront.
The crucible of systematic disenfranchisement
and haphazard violence of
urban Britain was the backdrop for
Grime’s origin story. It began with Wiley,
a member of UK garage crew Pay
As U Go, who began producing a different
kind of music that he dubbed “eskibeat”.
If the good vibes of garage felt
like an endless summer, Wiley was ushering
in winter. The sound was starker
and colder, which lead to him christening
his new tracks with names like
‘Eskimo’, ‘Ice Rink’, and ‘Igloo’. This
new direction kept the frantic tempo
of garage’s 140 beats per minute, but
was sonically more sparse and urgent.
The production was decidedly electronic,
with clicks, bangs and crashes that
didn’t even pretend to sound like any
musical instrument you had ever heard
before. As more producers followed after
Wiley, Grime began to take shape. It
was dark, industrial, and for the uninitiated,
it was thoroughly perplexing.
This truly new genre of music felt like
punk rock for the tower blocks – the
large concrete housing estates and towering
rectangles of low income apartments
that had been thrown together
after Britain, the East End in particular,
was ravaged in the Second World War.
In this melting pot of cultures, Grime’s
slang drew from Jamaican Patois and
dancehall music, while its energy and
MC-driven nature came from jungle and
drum-and-bass. Though closely related
to the party-friendly garage that bubbled
away in British clubs in the late
nineties and early noughties, the tone
of Grime was far-removed from the silky
vocals about fine liquor and even finer
women. Grime’s aesthetic was black
tracksuits and low hats in place of the
flashy Moschino that its older brother
wore. Garage’s Gucci loafers were
replaced with Nike Air Max, and thick
gold chains were now tucked into hoods
instead of on brazen display.
From its nexus of Bow, east London,
Grime spread via pirate radio stations,
vinyl, homemade music videos
and independently produced media
such as Lord of the Mics and Risky
Roadz. I kissed my first boyfriend to
the soundtrack of Grime MCs battling
back-to-back on sets – Grime’s equivalent
of a rap cypher – recorded live off
of illicit radio broadcasts onto cassette
tapes. As time went on, we even got our
own music channel. If you were lucky
enough to have a Sky TV subscription,
you could tune into Channel U and see
kids who looked and sounded just like
www.GriotsRepublic.com
www.GriotsRepublic.com

you strutting in front of cameras loaned
from local college media departments
for music videos that would also double
up as coursework for someone’s Media
Studies qualification. This industrious
spirit created a soundtrack to our lives
that actually sounded like us, instead
of the American exports
that were the
only permutation of
blackness allowed
visibility in the mainstream
media.
East Londoner and
former Wiley protegee
Dizzee Rascal
became Grime’s
first breakout star, signing to an actual
record label and beating Coldplay to
win the Mercury Prize for Best Album.
Dizzee’s album ‘Boy in da Corner’ still
stands today as one of the epitomes
of the genre and in many ways ‘Boy in
da Corner’ is Grime’s ‘Illmatic’. To bemused
middle-class music journalists
Dizzee was like an oracle, immortalising
the lives and mindset of a Britain
that for the most part was swept aside
Of course such
a virulent strain
of rebellion was
never going to go
unchecked...
and overlooked. “Don’t talk to me ‘bout
royalty ‘cause/Queen Elizabeth don’t
know me, so/how can she control me,
when/I live street and she lives neat,”
he spat forcefully on ‘2 Far’, while on
‘Hold Ya Mouf’ he directly addressed
our prime minister when he declared
“I’m a problem for
Anthony Blair.”
Of course such a virulent
strain of rebellion
was never going
to go unchecked,
and as Grime rose
in prominence, the
police got involved,
leaning on club owners
to stop giving Grime artists a stage.
Record labels could not contain their
interest, but were still weary, not quite
sure what to do sitting across the table
from the kind of young men that they
would usually cross the road to avoid.
In reaction to this, the enterprising nature
that enabled our scene to thrive
kicked into action once again. MCs began
to switch up the lyrical content, the
production softened away from the industrial
sounds of sirens and grating
basslines, and transformed into a style
of EDM that would open doors and pad
out bank accounts. Grime had evolved,
and some began publicly declaring that
it was dead.
But can a genre so potent ever truly die?
On the underground Grime was spreading,
like all contagions, further and further
afield. MCs were getting bookings
outside of the multicultural havens of
the bigger British cities, and we were
in awe as we watched footage of mostly
white crowds losing their minds to
Grime crews like Boy Better Know in
far flung European cities. Even America
began taking note. By now Dizzee had
already collaborated with UGK, and Jay
Z and Memphis Bleek had even rapped
doubletime over Lethal Bizzle’s Forward
Riddim at the Royal Albert Hall with
an actual live orchestra mimicking the
imitation string sounds from the original
track. Skepta assumed the role of
Grime’s ambassador when he vocalled
a Grime remix to Diddy Dirty Money’s
‘Hello Good Morning’, and since then
has schooled Drake on Grime history
and brought through the “mandem” in
all black with flamethrowers for the historic
Kanye West Brits performance that
horrified white audiences everywhere.
Grime’s influence continues to grow,
and the Grime kid generation who menaced
public transport with their impromptu
sets and tiny speakers have
taken the mantle from the pioneers,
flying the flag for the United Kingdom
of Grime near and far. Chip continues
to tour previously uncharted corners
of the UK and Stormzy was just one
of Grime’s stars to bless the stage at
SXSW this year. The power of the internet
has also spread Grime as far afield
as Australia and Japan. As something
that feels so iconoclastically British,
seeing Australian and Japanese MCs
adopt our culture right down the dancehall-influenced
slang, and iconic “oneline-flow”
is strangely both satisfying
and disorientating.
While I’m not as involved in the scene
as I once was, the success of Grime
still feels very personal. Grime grew
and matured as we did – or is it more
accurate to say that we grew and matured
as Grime did? Grime’s triumph
over the odds of disenfranchisement,
opposition, commercialisation, and
blacklisting feels like a parable for the
lives of a generation that was born into
one recession and came of age in another.
Grime has endured longer than
they thought it would, reached heights
they said it never could, and it’s a homegrown
reminder that so can we.
Jendella Benson is a photographer, filmmaker
and writer with experience in creative and
brand direction. Her work has been featured in
The Guardian, The Metro, The Voice Newspaper,
and also screened on London Live and OH TV.
Alongside exhibiting both in the UK and Canada,
she’e done public speaking appearabces at conferences,
university debates and also on TV.
www.GriotsRepublic.com

JAZZ
In Occupied China
Black Jazzmen at the Japanese Prison Camp
in Weihsien, China during World War II
WRITTEN BY DESMOND POWER
PRESENTED BY
Desmond Power, a third generation British
subject born in Tientsin (now Tianjin),
China in 1923, was incarcerated
along with 1,500 other foreign nationals
in 1943 in Weihsien, a Japanese Prisoner
of War camp in North China during World
War II. In the article below, Power recalls
Earl Whaley and other African American
jazz musicians who were placed there as
well and how their music lifted the morale
of the prisoners.
I
do not write this as a historian, nor
do I have sources to which I can refer
readers. I write simply as a contemporary
and close comrade of some black
jazz musicians with whom I was incarcerated
in a Japanese prison camp in
China during World War II. The war ended
67 years ago, yet most of my memories
of the time and place remain intact
though somewhat generalized.
First pictures of the
Japanese occupation
of Peiping (Beijing) in
China, on August 13, 1937.
Few need reminding that the Shanghai
of the 1920s and 30s was called the
“Paris of the Orient” for its profusion
of extravagant nightclubs, cabarets,
casinos, and bordellos, and that while
the US was dragging itself out of the
Great Depression, Shanghai was enjoying
a boom, its nightlife going full tilt,
attracting big names in the U.S. jazz
world eager to cash in on the opportunities
there.
As jazz band leader Earl Whaley told it,
by the time he arrived there in 1934,
most of the big names had come and
gone, but there was no stopping him

from cashing in. His seven man group,
the Red Hot Syncopators, that had set
Seattle, Washington’s jazz world ablaze
was now doing the same at St. Anna’s
Ballroom at 80 Love Lane, close by the
Shanghai Race Course.
His popularity zoomed, not only with
jazz lovers among the city’s 100,000
foreign residents, but also with the
modern set among the local Chinese.
For three long years, everything went
Whaley’s way. Money was good, living
cheap, and the racial demeaning of
blacks so common in the U.S. at that
time, was practically unheard of.
Buck Clayton, an acclaimed
American jazz trumpet
player, who went on to
become a leading member
of Count Basie’s “Old
Testament” orchestra.
Then in 1937 disaster struck when Japan
began its subjugation of China. Japan
was not quite yet ready to take on
the U.S. and its Allies (that would happen
4½ years later at Pearl Harbor) so
its forces avoided Shanghai’s foreign
settlements. However, those neutral
zones did not escape collateral damage
from the furious bombardment in which
hundreds of civilians perished.
No wonder American jazzmen wanted
out! They had not bargained on getting
caught up in a battle zone. Buck
Clayton, whose twelve man ensemble,
the Harlem Gentlemen, had arrived
in Shanghai the same year as Whaley,
booked out on the next ship. He was
good enough to offer his band passages
back to the States, and all but bass
player Reginald Jones, better known as
“Jonesy,” accepted and sailed off.
Whaley, who had decided to keep on
going in Shanghai, faced a tough problem.
His pianist, drummer, trombonist,
and trumpeter headed back home
without him. He was lucky enough to
sign on black pianist F.C. Stoffer and
to pick up Jonesy, who even before his
Shanghai days with Clayton was already
known in the jazz world, having starred
at Harlem’s Cotton Club and in Charlie
Echols’s fourteen piece orchestra.
Still missing a lead brass player, he negotiated
with the Filipino, Lope Sarreal,
who happened to be not only a star
trumpeter but also an eminent promoter
of musical and sporting events
throughout the Far East. As it turned
out, Sarreal signed up Whaley’s group
to be featured performers in his own
swing band.
The Lope–Whaley Swing Band continued
playing in Shanghai but not for long, for
by 1940 they were up north at Tientsin,
close to the ancient capital, Peking,
and under contract to play at the Little
Club there. Tientsin, like Shanghai,
was under foreign domination, but its
foreign population diminutive by comparison,
its nightclubs fewer and less
garish. Nevertheless, that didn’t stop
“Earl Whaley and His Coloured Boys,”
so named by the local press, from creating
a sensation at the club. They became
the talk of North China’s foreign
communities throughout 1940 and
most of 1941. Regrettably for Whaley,
the club’s visitors included the owners
of Peking Hotel, who made an offer to
his guitarist, Earl West, he could not refuse.
West, an original Red Hot Syncopator,
left to start up his own group in
Peking, Earl West and his Night Owls.
Then it all ended for the cozy world of
the Treaty Ports. At dawn on December
8th, (December 7th at Pearl Harbor)
Japanese storm troops swarmed
into the foreign settlements of Shanghai
and Tientsin and the Legations at
Peking. Allied nationals were ordered
to remain strictly within the bounds of
their settlements and to wear red arm
bands denoting they were enemy subjects.
In Tientsin, with banks and businesses
closed, many soon ran out of money
and food. With help from the Swiss Consul,
the Masonic Hall on Race Course
Road was converted into a mess where
Allied nationals could get a meal. Quite
a furor was caused among the volunteer
waiters vying for a chance to serve
the table taken by Mr. Whaley and his
famed jazzmen!
After their meal, the jazzmen would
move to a seating area where there was
a grand piano. The tallest musician,
the handsome and debonair one, ran
his fingers over the keys. Then, he drifted
into We Three with such a delicate
touch that the servers stood mesmerized.
They soon learned his name was
Stoffer. And it wasn’t long before they
got to share jokes with him and with
the clarinetist, Wayne Adams, and the
boisterous happy-go-lucky bass player,
Jonesy. But it was obvious from the
start that the older one, Earl Whaley,
was their leader and spokesperson. He

A monument
commemorating
the liberation of the
Weihsien Internment
Camp, Weifang,
Shandong, China.
(2010)
was not a bit shy in telling his audience
how he had put the band together in
Seattle and brought it to Shanghai, and
about their good and hard times there
and their surprising success in Tientsin.
Meeting at the mess hall nearly every
day throughout the whole of 1942 and
into the spring of 1943 allowed bonds
to form between those jazz players and
the British volunteer workers.
Up until then, life under the Japanese
seemed not all that hard to take, but
soon rumors began sounding on all
sides that they were preparing concentration
camps throughout occupied China
for the Allied civilians in their hands.
For once, the rumors had truth in them.
The 1,800 detainees in Tientsin, Peking,
Tsingtao and other North China
centers received official notice from the
Japanese authorities stating that early
in 1943 they were to be sent by train to
a camp at Weihsien, deep in the heart
of Shantung Province.
In March 1943, Earl West arrived there
with the trainload of 300 prisoners
from Peking. A day or two later came
the larger contingent of nearly 1,000
from Tientsin, among them Lope Sarreal,
Earl Whaley, Reggie Jones, Wayne
Adams, and F.C. Stoffer. As they were
about to pass through the camp’s main
gate, Stoffer doubled up in agony. His
appendix had ruptured. He was put on
the next train to the nearest town Tsingtao,
but he died before they could get
him to hospital there.
The black jazzmen were still in shock
over their cruel loss even as they were
having to meld into the curious cornucopia
of missionaries, academics,
doctors, lawyers, engineers, bankers,
traders, shopkeepers, clerks, bar girls,
and vagrants caught up in the Japanese
dragnet.
And the Japanese put the onus entirely
on the prisoners to do everything for
themselves, from collecting raw rations
to preparing and cooking meals on
primitive Chinese stoves, collecting garbage,
clearing drains, repairing buildings
(all in decrepit state) and caring
for the sick.
As days passed into weeks and the
weeks into months, the prisoners fell
into a routine that made life bearable
but they were always under a shadow
of not knowing what tomorrow might
bring. For jazz lovers this concern disappeared
altogether when the band voluntarily
played for them at dances.
Earl West was now the band’s leader. At
a typical camp dance, there he’d be, a
solidly built black American, standing
with his group in a space cleared of tables
in a kitchen eating area. He would
begin by snapping off a catchy allchords
intro on his guitar that launched
the combo into several bouncing choruses
of Shine, he and Jonesy coming in
with peppy vocals that had the dancing
couples and spectators showing their
appreciation with bursts of applause.
Then off again he’d lead the band into
two electrifying hours of old favorites,
including sometimes a jaunty Coquette,
sometimes Hold Tight, and more often
than not for a grand finale, heating it up
with an uproarious Nagasaki.
What a boon those dances were for the
romantically inclined, especially among
the shy! Many a couple’s relationship
started at a dance, some leading to
marriage. Earl West’s union could not
have been one of those, for he simply
worked too hard leading the band. In
April 1944, at a camp religious ceremony,
he married the beautiful English/
Chinese girl from Peking, Deirdre Es-

mond. Not quite a year later, in January
1945, their daughter Fern was born
in the camp hospital.
In the following weeks deep concern
spread throughout the camp, when Earl
Whaley was rushed to that same hospital
suffering from acute appendicitis.
Those who knew of Stoffer’s tragic
end dared not think the worst. But
thank God, Earl survived the surgery.
When visitors were allowed, I found him
in much distress, his stomach bloated
with gas. At his request, I called for a
nurse, but the high and mighty Sister
of some Victorian Nursing Order blasted
me and sent me packing.
Our internment ended with a suddenness
that astonished
us all. On August 17,
1945, a four engine
U.S. plane flew over
the camp, circled
it once, twice, and
then dropped a team
of parachute troops
within two hundred
yards of the perimeter.
The OSS team
that took over the
camp met with no
resistance from the Japanese. Within
days, squadrons of giant B29s were
dropping great loads of food, medicine,
and clothing into and around the camp.
World War II might be over, but the Chinese
Civil War between the Nationalists
and Communists burst out into the
open, cutting all road and rail traffic between
Weihsien and the outside world.
During the crazy and, bittersweet time
after we had been liberated but still
behind barbed wire, I heard that Earl
West wanted to see me. When I got to
his hut, he held out his precious guitar
and told me it was mine to keep. Of
In March 1943,
Earl West arrived
there with the
trainload of 300
prisoners from
Peking.
course, I refused. But he was adamant.
He wouldn’t take no. To this very day,
the man’s incredible generosity stuns
my mind.
In late September 1945, U.S. Marine
Corps officers at the port of Tsingtao
managed to arrange a cease fire between
the opposing Chinese armies
to allow trains from Weihsien to get
through, and two did before the line
was blown for good. And in one of those
trains the black jazzmen got away, all
of them sound of life and limb. From
Tsingtao, they sailed back to the United
States aboard the USS Lavaca. I never
had a chance to say good-bye, nor did I
ever see any of them again.
I never found out what
happened to Wayne
Adams after he returned
to the States,
but I was shown Earl
Whaley’s card after he
had established himself
as a real estate
agent in Los Angeles,
California during the
1960s. Jonesy alone
made it back to a regular
band according
to eyewitnesses who met him in Vancouver
(Canada) and San Francisco
while he was touring the West Coast.
Earl West’s daughter, Fern, told me that
on arrival at San Francisco in October
1945, her parents decided to settle in
the Bay Area. There they raised another
daughter and two sons before Earl contracted
lung cancer, from which he died
on October 19, 1959, at the early age
of 49.
After getting twelve good years use out
of Earl’s guitar in China, England, and
New Zealand, I handed it over to a Russian
lad keen to learn the instrument.
I’m sure Earl would have approved.
Desmond Power was born in 1923 in Tientsin
(now Tianjin), North China. He can claim the
status of Third Generation Old China Hand,
his maternal grandparents having settled
there way back in the days of the Dragon
Throne.
His easy life was shattered on December 8, 1941 when Japanese land forces
in China overran foreign settlements, committing their residents to prison
camps. The three camps in which Desmond was incarcerated became his
university. In each he observed prisoners looking out only for themselves,
while others gave of their all for the common good. Upon Japan’s defeat,
the jubilation of the sworn colonials was short-lived. Their special rights
were revoked and they were obliged to leave. In January 1946, Desmond
took part in the exodus of his own accord.
For more imformation visit www.BlackPast.org.
A relief depicting the story
of the Weihsien Internment
Camp located in the park
adjacent to the former
camp. (2010)

03 BATUKE
SAMBA FUNK
TRAVELER PROFILE
Batuke Samba Funk is a high energy Brazilian
band that mixes rhythms such as Funk from
the 70’s with afro samba, Brazilian big band,
batucada, soul, and R&B. The band attracts
a mixed crowd with people from all ages and
nationalities dancing in every performance. The
goal of Batuke is to “Brazilianize” American
sounds and “Americanize” Brazilian sounds in
a perfect balanced fusion.
Batuke was created in 2008 by Brazilian
bassist, composer, and musical producer
Diogo Brown, who was soon joined by Miami’s
well known Brazilian guitarist and composer
Cezar Santana.
Diogo’s versatility and musicality opened
doors for him to work with artists like: Nouvelle
Vague, Cris Delano (bossa cuca nova), Claudia
Leite, Ricky Martin, Don Omar and Lucenzo
(kuduro), Jon Secada, Mark Hudson and
others.
Most of the songs are composed by Diogo
Brown and Cezar Santana, with special
emphasis on the theme song of the CD, “Soul
Carioca” which has just been released in a
single as a tribute to Rio De Janeiro Brasil.
Visit www.BatukeSambaFunk.com for more
info.

CANNABIS
TOURISM
By Diana O'Gilvie
Marijuana tourism is on the rise worldwide
and a few key cities and countries
are leading the charge in this billion-dollar
industry. The socio-economic implications
are still formulating, but many governments
currently find themselves caught between legislating
marijuana supply, educating citizens
and stemming the tide of the drug trade.
In the United States, four states have legalized
marijuana for recreational use, but only
Colorado and Washington have licensed dispensaries
where you can buy marijuana with
a prescription or for recreational use. These
two states have marijuana tours reminiscent
of California vineyards, but city and state
tourism boards still shy away from promoting
marijuana as an attraction. Big hotel chains
also avoid marijuana-friendly advertising, so
weed travelers are booking cannabis tours
that already include accommodations.
In Amsterdam, unofficially dubbed the ‘Napa
Valley of Weed,’ the city offers more sophisticated
tours. When visitors enter the city’s
famed brown cafes they are handed a menu
with the offered marijuana strains of the day.
The Dutch’s approach to marijuana is directed
at the idea that every human being can make
their own decisions about matters concerning
their own health. This tolerant policy isn’t some
miraculous solution to abate drug abuse. It’s
common sense. Their approach is two-fold:
give citizens personal freedom of choice while
closely monitoring the drug abuse landscape.
Holland’s focus is primarily on public health
instead of emphasizing the criminal element.
This approach means government can be more
effective in informing the public on drug prevention
and testing. One such way, cracking
down on cultivation Holland’s government is
considering classifying marijuana with higher
levels of THC as a hard drug. Marijuana growers
are facing stiffer regulations. In the past,
people could grow up to five plants legally.
In 2011, new regulations narrowed the definition
of a professional as anyone who grew
marijuana with prepared soil, electric lights
and ‘selected seeds.’ Professional growers
names are added to a blacklist and face eviction
from government subsidized housing,
which is roughly half of the Dutch population.
This causes an increase in black market marijuana.
Human nature dictates that if you tell
people they can’t have something, they’re going
to want more of it. As a result, coffee shops
are taking risks in securing marijuana from
illegal enterprises, willing to absorb criminal
penalties. Naturally, marijuana is more expensive
and the quality shoddy.
Despite Jamaica’s ganja (local term for marijuana)
loving reputation, the herb is illegal. Jamaica’s
ganja cultural roots run deep and the
road to legalization is riddled with potholes.
Earlier this year, the government voted to decriminalize
up to two ounces of cannabis for
medicinal purposes, personal use and holy
sacrament of the Rastafarian community. A
criminal record in Jamaica makes it hard to
get a job or secure a coveted visa to America,
Canada or England. Decriminalization
unclogs the courts and frees up the police’s
time. A new ‘cannabis licensing authority’ will
regulate the cultivation and distribution of
marijuana for legal purposes. Tourists who
have prescriptions from their home country
can pay the Ministry of Health for permits to
buy marijuana during their stay in Jamaica.
The new law eliminates the unnecessary
source of friction between law enforcement
and citizens and ensures young people aren’t
shackled with criminal records for a little spliff
(local term for joint). Jamaica joins Argentina,
Colombia and Mexico in decriminalizing small
amounts of marijuana. Like these countries,
Jamaica recognizes that the harsh crackdown
on ganja has failed to stifle the illegal consumption
and trade.
When it comes to the legalization of marijuana,
Uruguay’s stance on the issue is landmark.
The country’s bold new laws legalizing
marijuana have positioned them as the only
country to license and enforce rules for dis-

tribution and sale of marijuana and makes it
the first country in the world to license and
enforce rules for the production, distribution
and sale of marijuana for adult consumers.
The nation’s aim to create a “legal, regulated
framework for marijuana,” making it the
first in modern times to do this. Dubbed “The
Great Experiment,” all the world’s eyes are
on Uruguay to see how they handle internal
and international pressure over the impending
weed boom and individual liberty.
How does the concept of individuality come up
against the government’s regulations? Where
do these countries get these numbers from?
Jamaica’s two ounces. Holland’s five grams.
Uruguay’s forty grams. It all seems so arbitrary.
Many savvy growers can yield ten pounds of
marijuana from as little as four trees. Worldwide,
country’s laws are shifting paradigms.
The freedom of legalization and restriction of
regulation are two sides of the same coin. One
of the tenants of the legislation and decriminization
is government regulates how much
citizens smoke and exact control over the supply.
Medical research and development will be
controlled by the state as they closely monitor
and restrict personal marijuana use.
BEST MARIJUANA TOURS
Denver - My 420 Tours
Personal service abounds on this tour. Founder
Matt Brown says, “Think of a friend who
shows you this is real.” The company offers
complete guided experiences. The Dispensary
and Grow tour ($129) gives visitors an education
on the sativa and indica plants, the effects
of THC and CBD, edibles and vaporizers.
Public consumption of cannabis is banned in
the state, however you can use vaporizers in
some hotel rooms. The tour stops by Native
Roots Apothecary for discounts on edibles.
Seattle - Kush Tourism
Seattle’s leading cannabis tour is cerebrally
focused. Founder, Chase Nobles, told the
Seattle Times, “Our tours more about education…
we take you to see something you can’t
otherwise see. The three- hour tours ($150)
includes stops at Sky Garden’s 30,000 square
foot growing facility on Harbor Island, pot
testing lab Analytical 360 and a glass blowing
class where visitors make their own pipes.
Amsterdam - Iamsterdam
Amsterdam is fluxed with café walking tours.
Reefer purveyors delight over café menu options
dubbed Flowerbank and Candy Kush.
City run, Iamsterdam’s two- hour tour ($30)
delves into historical and educational facts on
the cannabis plant and culture. The tour includes
the city’s first cafés in the Red Light

District and Chinatown also to famed coffeehouses
frequented by rock stars.
Jamaica - Hotbox Tours
Quick! When you think of Jamaica what comes
to mind? Odds are, ganja. Yet ganja tours aren’t
booming, in fact they’re barely making a
whimper. Jamaica has decriminalized ganja
possession of up to two ounces and households
are allowed four trees. Attorney, Lord
Anthony Gifford says, “The potential for Jamaica
to market ganja and make money is
enormous. We should do as Uruguay.” Ganja
farms are often on steep hillsides where
papaya and bananas trees form a canopy to
cover the plants. Hotbox Tours include lodging
($200). After breakfast with ganja tea, visit a
farm, learn to roll a proper joint, splash in the
nearby river. The tour embodies Jamaica’s relaxed
irie vibe.
Uruguay- Mvd High
Uruguay’s historical legislation makes it the
first nation in modern times to create a regulated,
legal framework for cannabis. At the moment,
the average citizen isn’t allowed to sell
marijuana, instead it’s offered as a gift. The
Sensorial City Tour ($200) is focused solely on
getting high. Ride in a comfy air -conditioned
van, visit a grow shop, the scenic grounds of
River Plate in Parque Rodo, panoramic views
of the Old City and local barrios. The final stop
is well timed for the onset of the munchies at
the Port Market.
Award winning writer/filmmaker, Diana
O’Gilvie’s work is driven by her global
curiosity and distinctive approach to
authentic story telling. She was contributor
to the travel anthology, ‘Trail-
Blasian- Black Women Living in East
Asia.’ Diana is also an avid photographer.
She has published photography
on Southeast Asian countries like
Indonesia, Singapore, Myanmar and
Malaysia. Diana’s photographic work
was displayed at Seattle’s Wing Luke
Museum in their summer 2013’s exhibition
on Asian sweets.

PHOTOGRAPHER
PROFILE
N O R M A N D E S H O N G
Griots Republic talked with Norman
Deshong, staff photographer at
both Madison Square Garden and
the New Jersey Performance Arts Center
about his photography.
When did you develop your
love of photography?
I started in Montclair High School doing
black and white shots in photography
class and some time later, I picked
up a camera at a friends wedding and
began to take shots (although they had
a photographer). The response to my
photos was great and it prompted me
to keep at!
What separates you from your peers?
I try to capture in photos what people
don’t see in themselves. I will take thousands
of shots and a dozen of them will
capture the essence of the person and
it’s those shots, that the client will love
the most.

Who have you worked with?
I’m currently the staff photographer
for both Madison
Square Garden and the New
Jersey Performance Arts Center
and have worked as the
personal photographer for Roy
Jones Jr, Local newscaster
Brenda Blackmon, and Dana
Owens (aka Queen Latifah) as
well as her mom Rita Owens.
I also love helping people with their craft. I
don’t mind helping others get better. I will lend
my camera or lens to others. If I’m being hired
to do a job, I’m getting paid; I can certainly help
another. That’s what makes me different.
What advice would you give to new
photographers?
Learn your tools. Know what kind of camera
you are working with; the type of lenses you
have. You have got to know the tools of your
trade. I use Canon cameras and lenses and I
always travel with multiple cameras to ensure
that I never miss my shots. I’m very excited
about my next phase of my work using drones.
Rita was very involved in with
Jubilation Choir which performed
under the umbrella
of New Jersey Performance
Arts Center (NJPAC) under
the direction Reverend Stephanie
Minatee and soon I found
myself taking photos for the
choir as well which led to my
becoming the house photographer
for NJPAC. This has given
me the opportunity to photograph
some of the biggest
names in music. Legends in
the business.
What is your favorite
thing to shoot?
OMG! I love shooting hockey!
These guys are big and the
speed of that puck!! I wish I
had played when I was younger.
It is definitely more challenging
because you have to
shoot through a small opening
and even there the puck will
come right through and bust
up your lens and head. That
is really exciting.

I also love shooting for the Knicks, The
Islanders, The Red Bulls, The Liberty,
and Rangers but my favorite is Hockey.
I’ve gotten shots of the President and
other events but, there are a million
other photographers there and many
shots will look alike but Hockey, is like
freezing time, especially when you capture
the puck in motion. No two photographers
will get that same shot.
Tell us about your New Orleans/
Katrina project…
I wanted to see the results of Katrina for
myself. So I went down to take photos
and we have been going back over the
last 10 years to photograph the progress
of the recovery with the hopes of
eventually chronicling it all in one volume.
What people are not talking about, is
what we want to capture, especially areas
in the 9th ward. I’ve had the opportunity
to see and take photos of the
work Brad Pitt is doing there. He has
built many, many new homes for those
impacted by Katrina. The photography
project just keeps going.
We have taken thousands of photos.
In fact, Judith Jameson has one of my
photos hanging in her home so, that
she never forgets the losses in New Orleans.
We must never forget that. Ever.
There are still spots that are still very
messed up. In fact, some of the schools
just reopened after being rebuilt.
Where have you traveled for your art?
Kenya, Dominican Republic, Puerto
Rico, St Lucia, St Vincent and a great
deal of the islands.
What three things do you live by?
1. Stay grateful and stay humble
2. Help others
3. Travel with more than two cameras
and lenses
Norman Deshong is a photographer whose
work has taken him throughout the United States
and all over the world. He has been published
in magazines such as Source, XXL, and Ring
Magazine, just to name a few and was featured in
Ebony Magazine in 2013. His work with the New
Jersey Performing Arts Center grants him access
to cover celebrities and global talent. For more
information on Deshong, check out his company,
Photography by DeShong, at
www.ndeshong.com.

Hola,
Morocha!
A Q&A with author, Jennifer Poe,
on publishing your travel memoirs.
Writer and author, Jennifer Poe, is
publishing a new book about her travels
throughout Buenos Aires. As soon as
we saw her post on Twitter, we jumped at the
chance to pick her brain. Continue reading
for insights on how you too can publish your
memoirs and make sure to follow Jennifer for
updates on her new book!
Tell us a little bit about yourself and
how you wound up in Buenos Aires.
Well, I’m a writer through and through. More
so than a blogger, I would say. But I was 16
when I started writing seriously with the goal of
publication one day. I began my artistic journey
as an underground poet and artist on the Lower
East Side and landed my first publishing credit
(Poem in We Got Issues) at the age of 20 and
was named one of the top New Yorkers by New
York magazine not too long after that.
I caught the travel bug, however, when I was
just 19 years old. It was the first time I had
been in an airport and I went to Paris. I haven’t
looked back since.
When I turned 22, I wanted to experience
living abroad for an extended amount of time
and had never been away from my family or
lived on my own and since I was going through
heartbreak at the time and going through the
emotions where the city sickens you because
every monument and piece of concrete reminds
you of the person you loved, I decided I wanted
to pack my things and leave.
A friend told me about Buenos Aires and as soon
as I saw pictures of the city I was in love. I also
noticed the absence of black people. I mean,
not a single one! I heard stories of racism and
was a bit scared and hesitant, but I said screw
it! I’m not going to let color define or deter me
from any part of the world I want to explore. So
I made my fear take the back seat, grabbed a
copy of Hemingway’s Movable Feast and took
off!
What inspired “Hola, Morocha! A Black
Woman’s Adventures in Buenos Aires”
and whom did you write it for?
My, my, my. Let me tell you. Living in Buenos
Aires was one of the most bizarre, yet thrilling
experiences of my life! Some of the stuff that
happened was straight out of a movie. I said,
“I have to document this!” So to stay sane, I
started the now defunct blog “Black Girl’s Guide
to Buenos Aires” while I was still living there.
I was surprised by how popular it became. At
the time, back in 2007, I was one of the few
black travelers blogging. I think there was like
ten of us. I can confidently say I am one of the
original black travel bloggers. Now the Internet
is saturated with them. This is a great thing!
But I still get emails from other black women,
who are embarking on their own journeys to
Buenos Aires, who need help or support to
quell the same fears I had. I’ve even inspired
some to travel there. That experience inspired
me to re-write Hola, Morocha as a book series.
Book one in the series is called Culture Shock
and I re-wrote it in a playful conversational way.
I want readers to feel like a friend is spilling the
tea from abroad!
I think we need more diversity in travel nonfiction.
I’m still having issues finding such
books. So to answer your question, the book is
for everyone who loves to read travel memoirs,
but targeted towards black women who want to
see more of themselves in travel narratives and
also black women traveling to Buenos Aires.
Can you describe the writing, editing,
and publishing process of going from a
travel blog to an actual novel?
I think they’re two different arenas. It’s one
thing to throw a travel blog up and then connect
it to your instagram and post pretty pictures
styling and profiling off the coast of Rio, but
it’s not going to help you sell books.
The number one thing is to learn book
marketing. You have to come up with a

day write their own travel memoirs!
What were some of the pitfalls you
encountered in bringing your product
to market? What would you recommend
other travel bloggers do to avoid those
same pitfalls?
This biggest thing I regret is not familiarizing
myself with book marketing when I first
started the blog. Writers tend to groan when
someone mentions platform or marketing, but
it’s absolutely essential. If I studied marketing
earlier, I would have known it’s more important
to build a direct connection with your reader
than scrambling to get thousands of likes and
followers on social media. Now I’m playing
catch up.
Also, self-publishing isn’t cheap. Editing alone
can be $1,000. I’m launching a Kickstarter July
1st to get Hola, Morocha into its final phase:
production, editing and design. And I feel I
must mention this: I noticed Amazon or even
Facebook advertising doesn’t really have an
easy way to market to young black travelers.
Morocha, but it’s structure was influenced
from a little known gem I discovered titled Post
Cards from France by Megan McNeill Libby.
It’s still one of my favorite books. I’m going to
read it again!
Stephen King’s On Writing, Ray Bradbury’s Zen
in The Art of Writing, Brena Ueland’s If you
want to Write and Rainer Maria Rilke’s Letters
to a Young Poet influenced my writing style. I’m
enjoying The Flaneur by Edmund White at the
moment. But my number one favorite writer
and guy is William Shakespeare!!!
It’s going to be a challenge to set my book
up in the right categories on Amazon to ensure
that my target market finds it. I’ve signed this
petition recently, calling for Amazon to add
more categories. So this is going to be an
interesting journey, but one I’m excited about!
When will the book be released and
where can readers buy it?
marketing plan and basically start looking at
yourself as a publisher: you have to hire book
cover designers, copy editors, proof readers,
purchase ISBN numbers, etc.. etc.. and form
an actual business for tax purposes since you
will be making money on Amazon and any other
platform.
I had to take a year off from blogging, which
can feel like running for homecoming queen in
high school. During my time off, I studied book
marketing and one of the things I discovered
during my research was a direct connection
with your reader is worth way more than a
Facebook like or an Instagram follow. So if
you’re serious about writing and selling books,
you must write, write, write a good manuscript,
learn book marketing, build a direct connection
with your readers and use your travel blog/
social networks as a hub for readers to connect
with and communicate with you.
My travel blog imported-chocolate.com serves
as such a place, but I also provide free resources
and travel guides for other women of color to
start traveling on their own and hopefully one
The tentative release date, depending on how
my Kickstarter goes, is mid August or early
September. I want to get it out before the official
end of summer.
What authors do you like to read?
What book or books have had a strong
influence on you or your writing?
I’m a bibliophile! So for the sake of brevity,
I’ll stick to non-fiction and say Hemingway’s
A moveable Feast inspired the idea of Hola,
Where are you heading next and what
can we expect from you in the future?
I’m heading to Cuba!!! I’ve wanted to go since I
was sixteen and I plan to do Havana and Vinales.
I’m going to start planning for it soon. I’m also
releasing four books in the Hola, Morocha travel
series and all four should be released this year
with the last one releasing in December, fingers
crossed!

04ANDROMEDA
TURRE
TRAVELER PROFILE
Andromeda’s professional career truly started
when she went on tour with Ray Charles as one
of his background vocalists, a “Raelette.“
An international success, Andromeda was featured
as the “Queen of the Blues” singing with
the Jazz Big Band at Tokyo Disney in Japan for
14 months. While there, she recorded her debut
album “Introducing Andromeda Turre” which
got her to the 2008 Grammy awards. Andromeda
took the album on the road and has enjoyed well
received tours in China, Croatia, Czech Republic,
India, Italy, Singapore, Thailand, Turkey, Vietnam,
and many more countries.
Andromeda has formal training in Vocal Performance
from Berklee College of Music, Theater
from the Boston Conservatory and Dance from
Alvin Ailey & Dance Theater of Harlem. She
also studied piano and composition from age
5. Growing up with Jazz musician parents Steve
Turre and Akua Dixon, Andromeda claims most
of her musical training from home.
Based in New York City, Andromeda continues to
perform both original works and standards with
her own group as well as being a featured vocalist
with many other bands. In addition, she works
as a vocal coach, songwriter, arranger, producer
and performance coach. With a valid passport,
Andromeda continues to take her voice all over
the world. For more information visit
www.AndromedaTurre.com.

TORONTO
CARIBANA
By Jason Francis
The summer tradition of Caribana
has been a staple of Toronto, Ontario
for nearly 50 years. On its surface
it is an ideal destination to soak in
strong elements of Caribbean culture.
The two week long event culminates in
a massive final weekend of fetes, the
pre parade J’ouvert celebration and the
Parade of Bands. For those who are unable
to make it down to the islands that
gave birth to it, Caribana has grown to
welcome in millions to partake in the
annual gathering.
Yet, as you dive further into the heart
of Caribana, now known as Scotiabank
Toronto Caribbean Carnival, you’ll see
that there is a lot more happening than
meets the eye. Caribana goes back to
the late 1960s, 1967 to be exact, when
Caribbean expats living in Canada threw
a massive street party as a sort of cultural
gift and community celebration
for Canada’s centennial. Led by the Caribbean
Cultural Committee this event
would continue annually and today It
has become quite a lucrative economic
campaign, bringing close to $400 million
dollars into the city. Unfortunately,
it is within that growth over the past
decade, that has led to a shift in the
community climate and now many find
themselves frustrated if not completely
disenchanted with the whole situation.
The Caribana of
old was not a city
government organized
event, but rather an
organic community
celebration.

mate. “At its core, Caribana is an inclusive
space that has the potential to
really uplift the black community in a
lot of ways. It also brings thousands
of people from across Canada and the
U.S. to the city each year and as such,
has put Toronto on the map long before
the likes of Drake and OVOFest came
around. In recent memory, it has been
marred with violence and calls of mismanagement.
While any festival of this
magnitude is bound to have problems,
it was particularly heartbreaking to see
this happen to something that is so
special to Caribbean people specifically
and the greater black community at
large.”
Toronto based media figures have also
taken notice of the issues facing Caribana.
Award winning radio host Dr. Vibes
raises this question, “The financial
state of Caribana is a concern. At the
present, they no longer have the support
of Scotiabank. I would like to know
how come Caribana [still] continues to
have financial challenges?”
One of the biggest aspects of Caribana
is its growth as a summer party period
beyond just the island themed festivities.
The hip hop world touches down on
Toronto to make itself known and with
it comes lots of money for the city. One
of the major voices of Toronto hip hop,
Erin Ashley aka Ellah, gives us another
view point on the tourist influence.
“For the past few years, people who
have enjoyed Caribana for decades with
their families, are now asked to pay to
watch the parade - scratch that, they
were asked to pay to watch the parade
behind 12ft tall barricades and an influx
of non-masqueraders pulling feathers
off costumes, ignoring requests of
The Caribana of old was not a city government
organized event, but rather an
organic community celebration. While
the Mas bands paraded
and danced,
putting their traditional
costumes
on display and the
tunes of steel pans
filled the air, the
people of Toronto
had a intimate relationship
with the
festival.
Can Caribana
survive amongst
the growing
disconnect felt by
the local people?
The J’ouvert celebration along with the
various fetes leading up the main parade
all served as a source of unity and
Pride for the diverse Canadian communities.
The people were not merely
spectators but were a full on part of
the experience. It is this sense of connection
that many feel has been lost
as Caribana continued to grow in scale
and scope.
While many tourists
view Toronto’s annual
festival weekend
as an ideal destination
to experience
Caribbean culture,
can Caribana survive
amongst the
growing disconnect
felt by the local people?
The sentiments of many Toronto residents
echoes a concern for the future
of Caribana for a few reasons.
Grade School Teacher, Sara S, expresses
her feelings about the change in cli-

and leaders and showing complete ignorance
and a lack of respect as to what
Caribana is about. Yet, it’s not the organizers
of the event that are to blame
- it’s a beautiful event and a staple event
in Toronto, both socially and economically,
but wise words to all the tourists
- find out what this event is about, why
it’s lasted decades, why you’re asked to
stand along the fences and not in the
parade and respect this cultural celebration.”
International writer, Lincoln Anthony
Blades, has chronicled his ongoing frustrations
with Caribana going so far as
to suggest its overall cancellation until
someone can right the ship.
“I would rather
not have a parade
than see my culture
get the **** beat
out of it year-afteryear,
while city
bureaucrats profit
from this.”
“This carnival is no longer a representation
of any part of my culture. I propose
that this festival is CANCELLED indefinitely
instead of running it deeper into
the ground. Give it a few years off while a
real strategy is put in place, even if that
means getting ScotiaBank the HELL out
of here and returning the parade to the
original Caribana founders. But I would
rather not have a parade than see my
culture get the **** beat out of it yearafter-year,
while city bureaucrats profit
from this.”
It seems that the current condition of
Caribana is the result of many factors
which makes it a complex matter to
tackle. I think long time Caribana Mas
Band player and writer, Bee Quammie,
sums it up best:
“We need a shift in the collective understanding
of what Caribana is about.
The embrace of sensuality in the parade
isn’t an invitation for gratuitous and unwanted
sexual advances. It’s not a space
to lord classism over the heads of the
people who may not have been able to
afford a costume, but still want to engage
and have fun. Caribana should not
be an opportunity for greedy corporate
entities to swoop in for the kill. And we
should all remember that Caribana –
the very celebration of Caribbean culture
- consists of more than the closing
weekend’s parade. The richness of
the culture is in every event, from Kiddie
Carnival to the King & Queen Competition
to PanAlive and much more.”
Make no mistake about it... Caribana,
the full festival - period - is a marvelous
time to be in Toronto. The city is
alive and charged with a special kind of
energy that you need to experience at
least once in your lifetime. The capital
of Ontario, a melting pot of traditions
and rich cultures shines bright during
Caribana even with its ongoing internal
struggles. The sights, sounds and tastes
of the city are truly to be enjoyed.
While a native Torontonian may have a
slightly different view on this Caribbean
celebration, no one will deny its value,
and deep rooted ties to the heart of the
city. Caribana going forward may look a
little different than from years past but
it’ll still be a time to remember.
Jason is a New York based social media manager
with a passion for the ever evolving digital space
of social media, blogging and marketing. He has
operated online in various capacities for over 10
years. He is also the Head of Social Media and
part of the overall managing team, The High Council,
of the Nomadness Travel Tribe. The tribe is
a 13,000+ member strong travel network focused
on sharing the value of travel with the Urban demographic
and introducing travel to the upcoming
youth.

ZYDECO
Cajun music and zydeco are closely
related parallel music forms.
Cajun music is the music of the
white Cajuns of south Louisiana, while
zydeco is the music of the black Creoles
of the same region. Both share
common origins and influences, and
there is much overlap in the repertoire
and style of each. At the same time,
each culture proudly and carefully preserves
the identity of its own musical
expression.
Cajun music is a blend of the cultural
ingredients found in south Louisiana.
The colonial French Creoles were singing
the same stock of western French
folk songs as the Acadians who arrived
in Louisiana during the mid-18th century
after being exiled from Nova Scotia.
Native American Indians contributed
a wailing, terraced singing style.
Black Creoles contributed new rhythms
and a sense of percussion techniques,
improvisational singing, and the blues.
The Spanish eventually contributed the
guitar and a few tunes.
The violin, which was a popular new
instrument in France during the 17th
century when the French left for the
New World, continued to dominate the
instrumental tradition until German
Jewish merchants on the south Louisiana
prairies began importing diatonic
accordions from Austria in the early
19th century. Acadian and black Creole
musicians alike began experimenting
with the accordion and developed
techniques which served as a basis for
Cajun music and zydeco. Anglo-American
immigrants contributed new fiddle
tunes and dances (reels, jigs, and
hoedowns) while singers translated the

English songs into French. By the turn of
the 20th century, these diverse ingredients
had combined to form what we now
call Cajun music.
Commercial recording companies like
Decca, Columbia, RCA Victor, and Bluebird
began recording regional and ethnic
music throughout America in the early
part of the 20th century. Since commercial
records were made to be sold, they
provided a good parameter of popular
trends and also gave an imprimatur to
the musicians they recorded. In south
Louisiana, popular and traditional culture
were the same at the turn of the
19th century, but soon enough the recorded
musicians began to set the style.
These irreplaceable
elements reveal the
style’s origins
in the cultural
creolization of Afro-
Caribbean and Franco-
American traditions
Joseph and Cléoma Falcon were fairly
well-known in their local community of
Rayne, but the release of “Lafayette” in
1928 made them much larger than life.
Everyone wanted to hear the Cajun musicians
who had made a record. The newly
improvised verse they had added to
their arrangement of an older traditional
tune immediately became a permanent
fixture of the developing core repertoire
of Cajun music. Musicians such as the
Breaux Brothers; the Walker Brothers,
Dennis McGee and Sady Courville; Angelas
Lejeune and Mayus Lafleur soon
joined the Falcons in defining Cajun music
style and repertoire on recorded. The
early recordings of 1928-34 featured
the accordion, fiddle, and guitar, and a
high-pitched singing style necessary to
pierce through the noise of dance halls.
By the mid-1930s, the Americanization
of south Louisiana was well under way,
and Cajun music reflected this strain on
Cajun culture. Accordions began to fade
from the scene as stringbands drifted
toward Anglo-American styles, incorporating
western swing, country and popular
radio tunes into their repertoires.
Rural electrification made sound amplification
available to country dance
halls producing changes in instrumental
and singing styles. Traditional Cajun
and Creole music was pushed underground
by new, more popular sounds.
However, Cajun culture and its music
resurfaced just after World War II. This
was not an intellectual movement, but
a visceral one.
Musicians like Iry Lejeune, Lawrence
Walter, Austin Pitre, and Nathan Abshire
responded to the demand from
Cajuns who were growing uneasy with
the loss of their cultural base. Thus,
Cajun music made a dramatic come-

ack during the 1950s finding its way
back into many country dance halls.
It did not, however, completely lose it
raw, rural nature. The revival was openly
regretted by the many urbanized and
upwardly-mobile Cajuns who sought to
distance themselves from such raucous
identity markers.
The revival was also immediately threatened
by the rock & roll explosion of the
mid-1950s. Young Cajun musicians
were understandably tempted by the
potential for money and fame as they
watched fellow Louisianans Jerry Lee
Lewis and Fats Domino shoot to the top
of the charts.
In the 1960s, traditional
Cajun music
was in danger of being
overwhelmed by
the popular commercial
sounds of country,
rock & roll, and
Beatlemania. National
organizations such
as the New port Folk
Foundation, Smithsonian
Institution, and
the National Folk Festival
began to encourage
the preservation
of traditional Cajun
music, sending folklorists
and fieldworkers
to record the oldest
styles and identify the outstanding
performers. The tradition was validated
with outside audiences as Cajun musicians
became a regular feature on the
folk festival circuit.
Now, given the
choice, many
young Cajuns are
choosing to play
the music of
their heritage
while still
maintaining their
contact with the
popular American
music scene.
companies to release traditional music
alongside their more commercial records.
He organized a folk-artists-inthe-schools
project to introduce Cajun
music to Louisiana students. He also
helped to organize festivals and special
concerts to provide new settings for
Cajun musicians and serve young audiences.
The results of Balfa’s efforts to
bridge a cultural generation gap were
soon evident. Now, given the choice,
many young Cajuns are choosing to
play the music of their heritage while
still maintaining their contact with the
popular American music scene.
Among the first young musicians to
experiment with Cajun music were
Zachary Richard and
an influential group
called Coteau. Richard
recorded soulful renditions
of traditional
and original arrangements
of Cajun dance
tunes for his Bayou
de Mysteres band. He
also discovered that
other parts of the
French-speaking world
were interested in Louisiana’s
French music,
especially when it was
jacked up few notches.
Led by Michael Doucet
on fiddle, Bessyl
Duhon on accordion,
and Bruce McDonald on electric guitar,
Coteau attracted a substantial young
audience with an exciting fusion of traditional
Cajun music and southern rock
& roll.
Master fiddler Dewey Balfa was determined
“to bring home the echo of
the standing ovations” he and his Balfa
Brothers Band had received in cities
across America. He eventually succeeded
in convincing local recording
Today in 1991, young musicians continue
to improvise new sounds and preserve
old ones. Zachary Richard has
kept his version of Cajun music up to
date with contemporary trends including
reggae and rap. Michael Doucet and

Beau Soliel have added a wide range of
influences including classical and jazz
to their strongly traditional base. Wayne
Toups preserves the spirit of his heroes
while developing his own hard-driving
ZydeCajun sound. Bruce Daigrepont
has produced stylish new songs in a
lighter pop-Cajun vein. There is even a
heavy metal Cajun group, Mamou, led
by Steve Lafleur, which runs traditional
waltzes through an electronic maze of
synthesizers and wa-wa pedals. Some
youngsters, such
as Steve Riley and
Cory McCauley, deliberately
play in
the old-time traditional
style, but
even they innovate
new harmonies and
arrangements. Even
staunch preservationist
Dewey Balfa
has invested in the
future, composing
what he calls “brand
new old songs.”
In South
Louisiana,
the meaning
of zydeco has
expanded (or
survived) to refer
to dance as a
social event and
dance styles...
Cajun music is no longer only a self-conscious
choice - it is part of the regular
music scene. The tradition is renegotiated
and reinvented weekly. One can
hear Cajun music in restaurants and on
the radio, on television, and at weekend
jam sessions. With an active recording
industry, festivals and scores of weekly
performances, young musicians how
have many opportunities to falling love
with the music of their heritage, role
models to emulate, and plenty of room
to experiment.
Zydeco, zarico, zodico, zologo, and
even zukey jump represent a few of the
spellings used by folklorists, ethnomusicologists,
record producers, and filmmakers
in their attempts to transcribe
the word performers used to describe
Louisiana’s black French Creole music.
The spelling zydeco was the first to appear
in print, used by ethnomusicologist
MacCormack in the early 1960s.
Today it is the most widespread label
and most record companies favor it.
Because its language is French or Creole,
zydeco tradition has largely remained
a mystery to outsiders. Folk
spellings and folk etymologist often
develop to explain or rationalize words
and expressions whose origins or exact
meanings have become
unclear. Native Louisiana
Creoles explain that
the word zydeco comes
from les haricots after
the expression “Les haricots
sont pas sale” (“The
beans aren’t salty”),
heard in many of the tradition’s
songs. However
recent studies based on
early Louisiana recordings
made by Alan and
John Lomaz suggests
that the term, as well as
the tradition, may have
African origins. The languages of West
African tribes affected by the slave
trade provide some clues as to the origins
of zydeco. In at least a dozen languages
from this culture-area of Africa,
the phonemes “za,” “re,” and “go”
are frequently associated with dancing
and/or playing music.
In South Louisiana, the meaning of
zydeco has expanded (or survived) to
refer to dance as a social event and
dance styles as well as the music associated
with them: Creoles go to a zydeco
to dance the zydeco to zydeco music
played by zydeco musicians. Used in an
expanded way, as a verb, zydeco seems
to have other meanings: “Let’s zydeco
them,” or “Let’s go zydeco.”
Community musicians are described
as zydeco kings, queens, and princes.
Community dance events, which
provide the primary opportunity
for courtship, are announced as
zydecos. The word zydeco also refers
to hard times and, by association,
to the music that helped to endure
them.
In black American tradition, this music
is called the blues, whether it be
a “low-down” blues lament which relieves
by purging, or a jumping, juking
blues which relieves by distracting.
Zydeco’s bluesy side is sometimes
based on melodies and rhythms of
a delta blues tradition. Other times,
an interesting confluence of European
and Afro-Caribbean rhythms and
sources produces haunting songs
which function equally well as blues
laments and as waltzes.
Amédé Ardoin, the first black Creole
musician to record in the late 1920s,
figured prominently in the development
of zydeco. His highly syncopated
accordion style and inspired
improvisational singing helped to
define the early style. Ardoin’s immensely
popular regional recordings
led the way for subsequent black
performers and influenced many Cajun
musicians as well - notably Austin
Pitre, Iry Lejuene, and later Michael
Doucet.
What we have come to call zydeco
today is the result of the experimentation
which occurred during the
late 1940s and 1950s. Black Creole
musicians combined older musical
traditions, which was the unaccompanied
black French shouts called
jures, with instruments then eventually
formed whole bands.
The dominant figure in the formation
of contemporary zydeco was Clifton

Chenier. His genius for combining older
black Creole French traditions with
rock and rhythm & blues is at the very
heart of contemporary zydeco. He also
pioneered the use of the piano accordion,
giving the tradition access to the
full range of the chromatic scale.
Other musicians
(Sidney Babineaux,
Herbert
Sam, and Boozoo
Chavis) also
contributed significantly
to the
development of
the form. Black
Creole duos like
Delton Broussard
and Calvin Carriere
or Alphonse
“Bois-sec” Ardoin
and Canray Fontenot preserve an early
pre-zydeco rural black Creole sound.
But there is an unmistakable tendency
toward soul and rhythm & blues among
Louisiana Creole musicians as zydeco
drifts toward the English-speaking
American market.
Over the last few years, second and third
generation performers (Alton “Rocking
Dopsie” Rubin, Lawrence Ardoin, John
In at least a dozen
languages from this
culture-area of Africa,
the phonemes “za,”
“re,” and “go” are
frequently associated
with dancing and/or
playing music.
Delafosse, Leo Thomas, the Sam Brothers,
Stanley “Buckwheat” Dural, Sidney
Semien, Lynn August, and Terrance
Semien) have pushed zydeco into bold
new directions. Yet the same band leaders
who insist on singing English lyrics
and adding saxophones, trumpets, and
electric guitars to
their groups will
demonstrate their
deep understanding
of the essential
tradition when they
play what they call
“du vrai zydeco.”
The “real stuff”
is usually characterized
by French
vocals. The rest
of the band drops
out while the accordionist
and the percussionists beat
out a jumping rhythm. The accordion
is transformed into a melodic drum,
sounding music like an African thumb
piano. These irreplaceable elements
reveal the style’s origins in the cultural
creolization of Afro-Caribbean and
Franco-American traditions.
B . B I R D W A T C H E R
Barry Ancelet is a folklorist and Chair of the
Modern Languages Department at the University
of Louisiana at Lafayette. This article was first
published in 1991 in the booklet, Musical Roots
of the South, which accompanied a series
of regional music tours featuring traditional
musicians sponsored by Southern Arts
Federation’s Regional Folk Arts Program, now
known as South Arts.

BLOGGER
OF THE
MONTH
A H O R A S E C R E T O
A B L A C K A M E R I C A N I N B L A C K P E R Ú
As I carried my drink from the bar to my
table with a big smile in anticipation of
seeing a popular black singer from Perú
at a Latin American club in San Francisco,
California, one of the owners passed me by
giving me a frightened look apparently not
used to seeing a black American at a Peruvian
performance. Perhaps, he thought I may
be casing the joint to plan a robbery; I don’t
know.
The seemingly suspicious individual knew
nothing of my exposure to Black Latin America
as I’ve traveled to nine countries, mainly
Perú, where I made repeat visits. He knew
nothing of the Peruvian neighborhoods I
visited, the families I stayed with, and not
to mention my ability to speak Spanish as I
earned my advanced Spanish certificate in
Peru.
It was in El Carmen, Perú, dubbed as the hub
of Afro-Peruvian culture, where I made my
first family-like connections, not only in the
home of the famous Amador Ballumbrosio,
the godfather of Afro-Peruvian music where
I stayed, but in the community where I also
made lifetime friendships.
Despite El Carmen’s abject poverty, crime
is next to zero. I could not help but notice
how the community lives in harmony; no
conflicts, no muggings, no stealing, and no
fights. When they party, they party hearty
without trouble makers spoiling the fun.
I’ve exchanged many greetings with total
strangers as we passed each other on the
street. During my first visit, I was made to
feel like a very special guests, consistently
being invited to parties, out for drinks, and to
other social events in the community. What I
love about El Carmen is that it is off the beaten
path—very few tourists with the exception
of the months of February and March when
they celebrate black heritage.

Susana Baca,
Ambassador of
Afro-Peruvian
Music and Peru’s
First Black
Cabinet Minister
People come from all over Perú,
and different parts of the world to
El Carmen, which is in the province
of Chincha, to celebrate with the
slogan, “Vamos Pa’ Chincha, Familia,
meaning “Let’s Go To Chincha,
Brothas and Sistas.” In Perú, blacks
are often referred to as “familia
(family).” One day, I went into a
rough neighborhood in Lima, the nation’s
capital, and I was greeted with
a loud, “qué pasó, familia,” which in
essence means “what’s up, bruh?”
Back in El Carmen, I had the pleasure
of eating home cooked Afro-Peruvian
meals as well as meals served
at the famous black-owned Mamainé
Restaurant. This “soul food” is prepared
with recipes that black Peruvian
women saved and passed down
from slavery.
According to unofficial estimates,
10-15% of Peruvians have African
ancestry and face perceptual racism
and discrimination. Monica Carrillo,
head of a Peruvian civil rights organization
known as LUNDÚ is pushing
for Peru’s rich African heritage to
be an equal part of Perú’s national
identity.
Some of the well-known Blacks who
contributed to Peruvian society include
St. Martin de Porres and his
tireless work on behalf of the poor;
Nicomedes Santa Cruz, a writer,
poet, and musician who helped raise
public awareness of Afro-Peruvian
culture.
Then we have Teófilo Cubillas, Perú’s
greatest soccer player ever, and of
course, the world renown singer Susana
Baca, the former Peruvian Minister
of Culture. In 1969, a man by
the name of Ronaldo Campos de la
Colina founded the world famous
dance troupe, Perú Negro (Black
Peru), which is billed as the Cultural
Ambassadors of Black Perú.
Teófilo Cubillas,
Perú’s greatest
soccer player ever.
As El Carmen has become my home away from home,
more and more people in the community are getting
to know me, or at least, have become familiar with my
presence. In fact, I’m even flattered that people who
didn’t have any communication with me on a prior
trip remembered me vividly upon my return. There is
a drawback, I’ve found, to all of this familiarity; especially
with my reputation as an American with a pocket
full of money. Some are beginning to think that
I’m a walking ATM. One woman showed me her gas
and electric bill and asked for my help. A young man
whom I tipped handsomely for showing me the ropes
around town frequently e-mails me asking for more
money. He is now in my spam folder.

Working together
for better health
Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield —
your choice for a healthy life.
Bill Smith, a certified professional résumé
writer, was born in St. Louis, MO, and raised
in New York City near Spanish Harlem
where he was inspired to learn the Spanish
language at the age of 10. Being self taught
in the language, his late Mexican American
friend, Yolanda, encouraged him years ago
to learn the culture as well as the language.
Bill took that advice to heart, and began
to travel and explore black cultures in
Spanish-speaking countries; thus, his blog
African American-Latino World,
www.ahorasecreto.blogspot.com
Visit us at www.anthem.com/inmedicaid.
Serving Hoosier Healthwise, Healthy Indiana Plan and Hoosier Care Connect
Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is the trade name of Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc., independent licensee of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association. ANTHEM is a
registered trademark of Anthem Insurance Companies, Inc. The Blue Cross and Blue Shield names and symbols are registered marks of the Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association.
AINMKT-0121-16 02.16

Griots Republic Vol. 1 Issue 7
July 2016
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