#544: Info request on Jamaican music: Davis responds to Brodwin (fwd)

[Robert Corbett <bcorbett@netcom.com>]

From: Karen Davis <kdavis@marygrove.edu>

    I highly recommend a book I am using this term in my Caribbean
humanities class, Peter Manuel's Caribbean Currents: Caribbean Music from
Rumba to Reggae. I also use a video I bought in Jamaica (probably at
Sangster's bookstore?)  titled "Fi Mi Love: A Musical Journey with the
Jamaican Folk Singers." (80 min, color).  ISBN 976-8092-05-X (comes with a
little pamphlet of words to the songs). This is of course Dr. Olive Lewin's
group. Produced by Caribbean Images Ltd., 34 Spring Way, Constant Spring PO,
Kingston 8, Tel 809-925-4883. There are about 40 folk songs on this video,
sung as they travel around Jasmaica, including to the Maroon area of Moore
Town, Portland District.
    Also, one of the videotapes in the British (BBC, I think)
"Repercussions" series on African music has a program on Caribbean folk
music, which as I recall, has one program featuring Jamaican and Dominican
(DR) folk music, including mento & a small junkanoo group (it's downstairs
in our library so I can't check it now--I also recently purchased a couple
of tapes on reggae/dancehall & will send you info after I check it).
    Related: Institute of Jamaica sold (sells?) a nice "Jamaican Folk Tales
and Oral History" videotape and related audio cassette, "Maroon
Storyteller," and a book by Laura Tanna. Many of the stories have songs as a
part of the story-telling.. Institute of Jamaica, 2a Suthermere Rd, Kingston
10, Tel 809-929-4785/6. The Island video Rhythms of the World Anthology is
all African & Caribbean selections, includes Dede St. Prix, Martinique, Los
Van Van, Cuba, Boukman Eksperyans, Haiti, Joe Arroyo y La Verdad, Caribbean
coast of Colombia. 
    Kenneth Bilby also did an album for Smithsonian Ethnic Folkways (FE
4027), 1981, Music of the Maroons of Jamaica, I have the vinyl & don't know
if they released a cassette or CD version.  Then there's Jocelyn Guilbault's
book Zouk: World Music in the West Indies (U Chicago 1993) but that's afield
from Jamaica. When I get to my home library, I'll search for more.
Have fun!
Karen Davis
Head of HUmanities Department, Marygrove College, Detroit, MI