History lessons with a beat…
I had revisited an old friend in the neighbouring town of Romana last week and yesterday myself, some top members of the current group and Pepin one of the oldest members of the community went to see him again. We brought with us the oldest snare (or ‘kittle drum’) player and had a great day going over the old style of playing.
The drum used to be made of wood and goat skin but as they now use a metal one with plastic skins the music has developed so that now most of the fife music is in the higher register. The old style was a little (only a very little) slower and used more melodies that had English lyrics. To get Rafael the old fife master and the old style drummer together was fantastic. We had such a good time in Romana that Rafael came back with us to San Pedro where we played outside the office much to the delight of the neighbourhood especially those who remembered the old style.
Have a listen to Auld Lang Syne as you’ve never heard it before on the Facebook music player.
Rafael (64 years old) was able to tell me about his grandfather who played fife and also the keyed flute which he still has. Continuing the history lesson, today was spent going round the old sugar plantations with another senior member of the community. We looked up some old residents of Consuelo where the biggest sugar plantation was and a rail station with about 150 lines in its heyday. Then we stopped off a little way down the road driving right through the cane fields, the same route that the old masquerade groups would have made in the 20s through to the 50s going from one town to another (apparently the sound of the drums amongst the cane fields was something else). We ended up in Angelina where I was able to chat with a powerful octagenarian lady Laurdes, whose great grandparents came from St Maarten. She was a top dancer in her day who danced the Wild Indians, Mummies, the Bull and the David and Goliath play. She is still a very powerful lady who I was reliable informed did not take any rubbish from anyone. She was full of strong memories and has been working with my friend Nadal reviving one of the traditional masquerades, the Bull Play.
The Bull Play tells the story of a masters’ bull who is sick and is revived by a traditional healer. It was performed this year for the first time in over 30 years.
On this trip I have been able to share with the community a film of the Bull Play and Mummies as performed today in St Kitts. It was the people from St Kitts and Nevis who brought many of the Christmas masquerade traditions to the island. The film was made by Joan F McMurray who has conducted a large research project about English speaking masquerade traditions at the University of Puerto Rico. I have also been able to give them a copy of the mumming play text which Peter Millington has shown is likely to be the text that went to the Caribbean and was used by the black community in St Kitts and then here in the Dominican Republic for their Christmas masquerades. You can read more about this journey of a folk tradition on the Stories Beyond Boundaries page of the website.
