Grenada has a rich musical culture comprising both traditional and contemporary art forms. Traditional music includes folk songs and dances, the cocoa lute, tamboo bamboo, string bands, and hand drumming. Several traditional musical styles are unique to Carriacou, Grenada's sister island, including Big Drum. Contemporary Grenadian music and its performance both shape, and are shaped by, social and cultural contexts. Popular musical styles include calypso, steel pan, and soca. Other pan-Caribbean and American genres also have a major presence, including reggae, dancehall, rap, hip hop, R&B, jazz, pop, gospel, and even country and rock ’n’ roll. Spicemas, the annual celebration of Carnival, is Grenada’s foremost cultural festival.
Traditional Music
Traditional (sometimes also called “folk” or “grassroots”) musics in Grenada are African- and European-based syncretic artforms that were historically culturally significant to the black working-class population. They are comprised of both (1) the African customs and cultural features the enslaved retained to cope with the trauma of their situation; and (2) the European customs and cultural features that the French and British brought with them to the island.
Traditional music in Grenada encompasses folk song and dance, extemporized singing, tamboo bamboo, and drumming. The cocoa lute, a one-string instrument made of the sucker from a cocoa tree, is perhaps the only instrument that is considered to be indigenous to Grenada. The sucker is pliable and bent into a bow with some catgut and is played by simultaneously striking the catgut while humming and using the mouth as a resonator.
Traditional music in Grenada encompasses folk song and dance, extemporized singing, tamboo bamboo, and drumming. The cocoa lute, a one-string instrument made of the sucker from a cocoa tree, is perhaps the only instrument that is considered to be indigenous to Grenada. The sucker is pliable and bent into a bow with some catgut and is played by simultaneously striking the catgut while humming and using the mouth as a resonator.
Folk songs are tonal and have a strong rhythmic quality that is usually emphasized by accompanying hand drum, shakers, and possibly guitars or other string instruments. Lyrics on a variety of topics are sung in English, French patois, or a combination of these, and vocables such as ay-yai-yai are sometimes interjected during the song.
Folk songs often feature dancing as a part of their performance. Popular dances include the belair, a dance accompanied by singing, drums, and shakers that is performed at festivals or ritual feasts; the quadrille, a partner dance performed with violin, bass drum, and tambourine; the Big Drum (practiced exclusively, or nearly so, on Carriacou), a ritual in which participants display different dance moves based on one’s real or assumed African ancestry to singing, drumming, and other percussive instruments; and the maypole, a circle dance around a large wooden pole to which ribbons are affixed and held by dancers who weave to form a braided pattern along the pole and which is accompanied by a variety of singing, drumming, and other instruments. String bands, also a prominent genre historically, are small ensembles of guitar, cuatro, violin, bass drum, chac-chac (shaker), mandolin, tambourine, and various homemade instruments of iron or steel. Although now mostly only played at festivals, string band music was customarily performed at funerals or wakes, fêtes (parties or celebrations), the opening of shops, and other local events. Tamboo bamboo is a rhythmic stomping of pitched bamboo sticks utilized in the late 19th century as a response to European suppression of drumming. Tamboo bamboo is still practiced by some Grenadians. |
Hand drumming has historically been and remains one of the most prominent forms of traditional music in Grenada. The drum is often perceived as representing African nationhood and resistance to slavery and plays an important role in folk culture and in folk religions such as Shango. Specific rhythms unique to Grenada, the most prominent of which is the Jab Jab rhythm, are considered important in traditional and contemporary music alike. |
Steel Pan
Steel pan plays a significant role in Grenadian musical culture. The genre, which originated in Trinidad, evolved out of tamboo bamboo (the rhythmic stomping of pitched bamboo sticks) and has a history of representing resistance and subjugation. Pannists strike chromatically pitched steel drums with rubber-topped sticks, either alone or collectively in a steelband ensemble that consists of multiple pans of varying musical ranges, a drum kit, and other ancillary percussion instruments.
Although there is music written specifically for pan, musical arrangements of calypsos, pop music, and even Western art music are more common. Tunes generally feature quick melismatic passages, rolled long notes, and syncopated rhythms. A strong, constant beat provided by the rhythm section lends itself naturally to dancing, and movement is therefore almost always a part of pan in practice and in performance. There are several steelband groups on mainland Grenada, including Angel Harps (Tanteen, St. George’s), Commancheros (St. Paul’s Community Center, St. Paul’s), Rainbow City All Stars (The Quarry, Chapel Road, Grenville), New Dimensions (Melville Street, St. George’s), Florida All Stars (Florida, St. John’s), Pan Wizards (River Road, St. George’s), Pan Lovers (Grand Anse Valley, St. George), Corinthians (Corinth, St. David), Pan Angels (Grand Roy, St. John), West Side Symphony (Florida, St. John) and Pan Ossia (Back Street, Gouyave). |
Calypso
Calypso music is culturally understood as an influential medium for negotiating morals, ethics, and ideologies. Before literacy was commonplace, the role of calypso as “the poor person’s newspaper” was integral to the art form; lyrical content, usually composed by the calypsonians themselves, is generally political or satirical in nature. In spite of calypso competitions driving the genre in contemporary times, the original news-disseminating aspect of calypso still exists today.
Present-day calypsos employ a verse–chorus form and are performed by a (usually male) lead singer who typically sings under a sobriquet or pseudonym, backup singers, and a dance band with amplified guitar, drums, and brass instruments that play percussive rhythms and melodic accompaniments. The tunes are comprised of simple minor or major melodies that take place over tonic-dominant-tonic harmonic structures and are repetitive and predictable. These melodies are highly rhythmic, and syncopated rhythms provide the backbone for many songs. The tempo, which is generally midrange to upbeat, encourages movement and dancing. Popular conventions in competition and performance include call-and-response interactions with the audience, familiar musical motives and vocables, extemporized verbal engagements, and collective bodily movement and dance. |
Soca
Soca is a verse–chorus song form performed by artistes who sing melodies in 4/4 time on top of sparsely textured, prerecorded digital 'riddims' that are fast, driving, and highly repetitive; and assembled using drum machines, synthesizers, sequencers, samplers, digital multitracking, and autotune. The melody, which is also generally highly repetitive, is frequently narrow in range and may have many repeated notes and words, which can contribute to an entrancing effect. Lyrical content includes themes of fêting (partying), drinking, love, arousal, and national pride.
As with calypso, male soca artistes frequently use sobriquets that connote machismo and male strength and supremacy. Stylistic conventions in competition and performance include audience participation, which takes the form of jumping, wining (a dance move featuring a gyrating, winding waist), waving flags and rags, singing along, and shouting and cheering. |
Carnival (Spicemas)
Grenada’s present-day Carnival, called Spicemas, comprises traditional Carnival components such as steel pan, calypso, and mas, alongside more contemporary components, such as the Soca Monarch competition. Originally a pre-Lenten festival of merrymaking, Carnival was introduced to enslaved Africans in the Caribbean by French settlers in the late 1700s. In 1981, Grenada’s annual celebration of Carnival was moved to August largely for touristic purposes, and it is presently the most popular and income-generating cultural event on the island. Spicemas events begin on a Thursday and include the Queen Show, a pageant to name the Carnival Queen; the Calypso, Groovy, and Soca Monarch competitions; Panorama, a steel band competition; and J'Ouvert Morning. Grenadian J'Ouvert is unique compared to other islands. |
J’Ouvert is an early morning outdoor revelry in which participants play jab, painting themselves completely black with old motor oil or grease and then adorned with horned helmets, chains, and other items representing slavery. Other revelers cover one another in brightly colored paint, consume alcohol, and dance; or take part in Ole Mas, wearing placards with double entendre messages and/or dressing in satirical costumes to highlight social issues. Following J'Ouvert is Pageant Mas, in which participants dress up and act as folk characters (Traditional Mas), or in fancy costumes (Pretty Mas) while dancing down the road in their respective mas bands. Carnival Monday closes with Monday Night Mas, a nightlong street dance party with glow sticks. Spicemas concludes Carnival Tuesday with a final Parade of the Bands.
Jab Jab music, a male-dominated genre popular during the Carnival season, is thought to be the only modern musical genre that is uniquely and authentically Grenadian in origin. It features many of the same characteristics as soca music including an upbeat tempo, narrow melody, and a repetitive digital riddim created using synthesizers, sequencers, and sampling, as well as the distinctive Jab Jab rhythm, a repetitive blaring conch shell sound, and fast drumming. Textual content revolves around the Jab Jab folk character and J’Ouvert morning celebration.
Sections extracted from other publications by the author. |