18334: (Chamberlain) Lolo sings for change (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Greg Chamberlain <GregChamberlain@compuserve.com>

(Miami Herald, 8 Feb 04)



Haitian rocker sings for change

The man who once sang to support President Jean-Bertrand Aristide in 1991
is now singing for his resignation, becoming a fixture at student-led
opposition demonstrations.

BY JACQUELINE CHARLES



Theirs was the anthem that energized a movement to drive out a military
dictator and rally Haiti's first democratically-elected president to
victory.

Their ritual rhythms and rebellious lyrics drew thousands into the streets,
singing, ``My heart doesn't leap. I'm not afraid. I'm not afraid this
year.''

Fourteen years later, Haiti's most famous roots rockers are singing again.
But this time, it's not in defiance of the military. It is in contempt of
the president they helped propel to victory: Jean-Bertrand Aristide, the
man they once hoped would shepherd Haitians into a new era of democratic
freedom.

''A servant of the people who does not work on their behalf, who is doing
corruption, who is killing people, who is repressing people, he cannot
stay. We cannot accept that,'' said Theodore ''Lolo'' Beaubrun Jr., the
lead singer, songwriter and founder of Boukman Eksperyans, Haiti's
Grammy-nominated mizik rasin, or roots music, group. ``Principle is
principle. When someone does something bad, it's bad.''

Last week, Beaubrun was in Miami recording the lyrics to several new
anti-Aristide songs, currently being sung in the streets of Haiti as police
clash with demonstrators.

Like many before him in Jamaica, in Nigeria, in South Africa, in Brazil and
even in the United States of the 1960s, Beaubrun sees himself and his band
mates as social activists, using music to promote social and political
change on behalf of poor, voiceless and disenfranchised Haitians.

Their music celebrates the country's Vodou traditions as it decries corrupt
governments.

''They are part of a much wider movement you see among African diasporic
artists,'' said Gage Averill, an ethnomusicologist at New York University
who has written extensively on the relationship between Haitian music and
politics. ``You can find parallels with the late Fela Kuti in Nigeria or
Thomas Mapfumo in Zimbabwe. These are artists who have used their role as
cultural figureheads to take on being spokespersons for the political
movement.''

Among a group of more than 200 Haitian artists and intellectuals demanding
Aristide's resignation, Beaubrun has become a fixture at a mounting string
of student-led opposition demonstrations in the streets of Port-au-Prince.

''I never supported him, but I supported what he was trying to do,''
Beaubrun, 47, said of Aristide, who is now serving his second stint as
president.

The highly politicized songs now being recorded by the group are a drumbeat
for change, describing the growing frustrations with Aristide and his
Lavalas Family party.

While one song asks, ''What is Aristide to us that we cannot kick him
out?'' Another written by Beaubrun for Haiti's upcoming Carnival later this
month challenges Haitians to change their society.

A third speaks to the clamp-down on demonstrators while alluding to
allegations of government corruption: ``We have a right to protest. It's
not money I am asking you for, or cocaine. I have a right to protest.''

Farah Juste, a well-known Haitian singer and local Aristide supporter, said
the fact that an artist like Beaubrun can demonstrate and openly criticize
the Haitian government shows that democracy is flourishing in Haiti.

''Years ago, people could not do it,'' she said, referring to Haiti's
dictatorship era. ``It is the right of every Haitian to express themselves
the best way they know how, and I welcome every political opinion because
it is a beautiful thing.''

She is not surprised by Beaubrun's change of tune.

''Democracy has been planted, and democracy has to flourish,'' said Juste,
a Miami resident. ``People say the whole country is protesting against
Aristide. Part of the country is protesting against Aristide, and part of
the country is protesting for Aristide. That is the reality of things.''

Once considered a messiah by countless Haitians, Aristide is today
embroiled in a three-year-old political deadlock with opponents who are
taking to the streets in sometimes violent protests demanding his ouster.
This weekend, police and rebels were battling for control of the city of
Gonaives.

Aristide has refused to step down, saying he will do so only when his term
ends Feb. 7, 2006.

Founded in 1978, Boukman Eksperyans has recorded eight albums -- one of
which (Vodou Adjae , 1991) was nominated for a Grammy. Just as reggae
artist Bob Marley used his music in the 1970s to address Jamaica's social
and political ills in hopes of bringing about a new black consciousness,
Boukman aims to do the same with Haitians, drawing on Vodou beliefs and
practices.

The group's songs tell the story of Haiti through lyrics set against
traditional Vodou rhythms and western pop fused with rock, folk, reggae,
jazz, and rhythm and blues. Commonly referred to as roots music, the genre
evolved in the late 1980s after the overthrow of Jean-Claude ''Baby Doc''
Duvalier.

Beaubrun, with his waist-length dreadlocks, is the storyteller in the
11-member band, which also includes his wife. He tries to speak to Haiti's
current social and political plight through songs couched in metaphors and
African proverbs.

Beaubrun said his disillusionment with Aristide began in 1995, after the
president returned from exile. It became sealed, he said, following Dec. 5,
when pro-Aristide thugs barged into the State University of Haiti in
Port-au-Prince, broke both of the legs of the university's president and
held the students at gunpoint.

''We wanted the government to change. It did not change,'' he said
emphatically.

That was also the call in 1990 when Beaubrun, in defiance of Prosper Avril,
the military ruler who ran Haiti at the time, wrote the lyrics of Ke-m Pa
Sote (My Heart Doesn't Leap/I Am Not Afraid). The song is featured on the
group's Grammy-nominated album.

The song's emotionally-charged lyrics became a symbol of resistance for
disenfranchised Haitians seeking to oust Avril. It was later used by
Aristide's supporters, who made it a battle cry to mobilize Haitians.

Beaubrun said he never liked the fact that the song became associated with
Aristide, but there was nothing he could do once it took on
larger-than-life proportions.

Since his high-profile involvement in the current opposition, Beaubrun said
he has been ambushed four times and had bullets shot at him three times
during clashes with pro-Aristide supporters. He was not hit.

''My life is in danger,'' said Beaubrun, who noted that he preaches
nonviolence resistance to his student demonstrators. ``Even in Miami, I
know my life is in danger. But it doesn't prevent me from doing what I want
to do.

``We know we are working for the Almighty; we are working for the spirits,
and we are not afraid of anything. What we want is a revolution. We want
that deep change in Haiti . . . That is why we have to watch out for the
pseudo dictator.''