We met some people briefly at the Bayou Teche brewery and ran into them Thursday night at Festival. They told us about a historic Acadian Village they’d visited and enjoyed. That was our Friday afternoon event before heading to downtown Lafayette. It’s a beautiful property and they’ve done a good job of creating what a small village would have been like. The buildings were all moved from other locations. There are several homes, a blacksmith shop, doctor’s office, church, general store.
Perhaps the unique band of this festival, that we heard, is San Salvador from a ery small hamlet, Sainte-Salvadour, outside of Avignon, France. Six friends (2 pair of siblings) who grew up together. Using just their voices, 2 drums, clapping, and a tambourine they create riveting harmonies that had me rapt and actually brought tears of emotion. Here is how Mark Sampson, who interviewed them and attended a workshop, describes: “Working in a call-and-response fashion, together they embellish the phrase with vibrato and variations of pitch, and build it by repetition into something hypnotic and trance-like.” Although completely different, both Ed and I were reminded of Dakha Brakha in terms of harmonizing and pitch. We would have gone to her them a second time the following day but for the cold rain and breeze which blew in just as we arrived downtown.
We braved it for the walk in and to a stage, but it was just too uncomfortable. Home we went to return later, which while still cold and blowy was at least dry. I warmed up real fast dancing to Corey Ledet and then Rockin’ Dopsie, Jr. – both zydeco masters. Dopsie, in fact has lots of credits to his name, music used in films and recording with Paul Simon on his Graceland album. I don’t know how old he is, but man can he move, including dropping to a split and bouncing back up. He’s a real entertainer! So glad we saw him here as we missed him at French Quarter Festival.
Closing out our night was Lisa LeBlanc who we also heard the night before. She’s from New Brunswick. Again, an energetic entertainer, full of life and laughter and humor. She describes the cuisine of her area as grey. No spices, just salt. Everything is boiled. Even has a song about it. Her band was tight. They all just semed like they have a helluva good time together. Another thing we really appreciated: before their encore, Lisa left the stage. The bass player then introduced the crew, starting with support. He really took his time introducing band members all the while playing background riffs. Then Lisa came out for the finale. It was raucous fun!
And that was a rap for us!
Shared Illusions 