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Creolization in the Caribbean-Spanish

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  Creole Music of Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic is a country that exists in the West Indies, and its music has been influenced by the native Taino, West Africans, and Europeans. This mixture of cultures resulted in creolized musical forms like merengue. Merengue is common across the country and mostly identifies as a national musical style. Merengue features a rhythm that alternates from moderate to fast, including a 2/4 pattern. The guira is used to play the rhythm alongside the tambura. The accordion is another instrument that is mostly used when playing merengue music.   Guira Source: https://cdn.wallapop.com/images/10420/0z/__/c10420p46421/i85883.jpg?pictureSize=W640 A picture of tambura Source: https://collectionapi.metmuseum.org/api/collection/v1/iiif/505683/preview Above is a video demonstrating the history of merengue music, highlighting the different influences from Africans and Europeans. Above is a video that demonstrates the merengue dance and mus...
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Creolization in the Caribbean Music-Dutch

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 Dutch speaking regions of the Caribbean Tambu is a music style that is common to the Dutch Leeward islands. While commonly found on Aruba, Gangelhoff and Legrand (2016) posit that the word is taken to mean a dance and music that accompanies the dance -as well as the drum used to play the music. The tambu drum is an example of membranophone made from sheep-skin and characterizes and call-and-response singing where some participants contribute through clapping of hands and thumping of feet. Couples playing the tambu dance often refrain from physical touching making it different from other couple dances that invest of physical contact. Jong (2010) adds that Tambu emerged from slavery in the ABC islands; specifically Curacao and is connected to ethnic groups which used the music and dance to establish “varying senses of   individual and collective belonging. The tambu (drum) is a crucial instrument that is used to play tabu music and is generally a sheep-skin drum made out of “a ...
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Creolization in the Caribbean Music-French

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  The Caribbean region enjoys a cornucopia of cultures. The region portrays a true example of creolization as in addition to the English speaking cultures; both in music and food - from Jamaica to British virgin islands, the Caribbean region also features French-speaking cultures in regions like Martinique, Guadeloupe, to Curacao.   Researchers Gangelhoff and LeGrand (2019) present various creolized forms of music in their book that are found in the French-speaking regions. Balutansky and Sourieau (2016) discuss more on the french west indies in their book, stating that regions like Martinique “ encounter of a marvellous cultural complexity and of an immerse solitude.p.20” It is in Martinique that I shall draw my first example of creolization in music within the French West Indies. The fact that it is rich in culture, but often at the mercy of regions like Guadeloupe and Haiti, I thought Martinique might have more to offer, and that is why I chose it. Having faced multiple nat...
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Creolization in The Caribbean Music-English

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  In light of creolization, there are many evidences from the Caribbean region that portray how cultures have intermingled creating one super cultural form. Jamaica is among the countries in the Caribbean region and like many others, they have some aspects in music that have evolved as a result of creolization. Gangelhoff and LeGrand (2019) proclaim that Jamaican music has undergone evolution resulting to genres like Reggae to pop up. Reggae s a music genre originated from Jamaica following the fusion of ska and rocksteady focusing on the second and forth beats, -offbeats (Gangelhoff & LeGrand,2019).   Romer (2019) on an article on Live About adds that reggae is a derivative of traditional mento music in addition to ska and rocksteady. Artists like Burning Spear have made a lot of contributions to Jamaican Reggae music during its wave in 1960s and beyond. The song “Identity” by Burning Spear demonstrates the musicality of reggae as it focuses on the offbeats. This piece is...
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Creolization in Caribbean Music-Intro

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The theme I chose is creolization which is caused by intermingling of cultures and facilitated by migration.   The World Economic Forum estimates at least 272 million people migrate internationally. This is approximately 3.5 percent of the world’s population. There are several reasons why people migrate and the most significant in this case, covers the migration of Africans, Europeans, and Asians during the 1600s. during this era, slavery was prevalent hence facilitating the shipment of slaves from Africa, to the Americas. The Caribbean region is best known for the plethora of cultures. Most of the dynamism attributes to migration of people from across the globe into the region. Gangelhoff and LeGrand (2019) in their book, “Tour De Force: A Musical Journey of the Caribbean” discuss the intermixing of cultures in the region giving birth to an all in one culture that incorporates elements of the distinct cultures,- especially in the field of music, and food. Gangelhoff and LeGra...
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