June 1, 2003 – A cadre of St. Croix residents is heading out over the next several months to preserve the words and sounds of Crucian musicians.
The community got a taste of the words and sounds they'll be seeking out at a March "summit" where some spoke, some sang, some played and some danced. The demonstration at the University of the Virgin Islands campus cafetorium showcased the importance of music in the cultural life of the island.
UVI Humanities Division faculty member Gene Emanuel was master of ceremonies for the "Summit of Tradition Bearers" marking completion of the four-day workshop presented by the Alton Augustus Adams Music Research Institute. The institute is the St. Thomas branch of the Center for Black Music Research of Columbia College in Chicago. The workshop was funded in part by the V.I. Humanities Council.
Emanuel knew how to pull the words out of self-professed reticent persons. Once he got Fred Thomas going, there was no stopping his reminiscences about early days with bands and what exactly characterizes St. Croix musicians. Thomas, born mid-island, had much to say about that — that he's neither Christiansted nor Frederiksted. Emanuel tried to get him back on the music track by asking about his years playing in Puerto Rico, and Thomas had lots to say about that, too.
Next, Emanuel turned to Sylvester "Blinky" McIntosh. McIntosh observed that he used to think the definition of a musician was one who could read music; in time he learned that St. Croix musicians can get the feeling across without that skill. Later on, he talked about his lengthy association with bands, starting with his father's Merry Makers dance band. "There's a little bit of everything in my music," he said, noting how he had liked the sound of merengue from early on.
Then Emanuel got Helen Joseph and Gail Watson-Chiang exchanging ideas, both of them most willing to express their views. Joseph, noting that St. Croix is the "land of seven flags," said what she learned of music came from all seven: calypso, church, Latin, French, quadrille, the southern step from the Danes, Spanish beat, and language from an old-time radio station. "St. Croix musicians are accomplished musicians" was her characterization; they can play anything.
Watson-Chiang, a tradition bearer in her own right and by heredity through her mother, Leona Brady-Watson, observed that cariso — from "carry it so," she said — was "used from slave days to send messages, to curse, to make love, to tell jokes." Her mother, she said, brought cariso back to life on St. Croix.
"Our culture became inclusive, not exclusive," she said, noting that the Virgin Islands was part of the Harlem Renaissance. It is "open to the world," she said, and events such as the summit are important "so the young people can know the history, and see that music kept the race alive."
Following the platform conversations, special tributes were presented in absentia to Ethel McIntosh and Brady-Watson, both well-known cariso singers.
At the reception that followed, the chairs were pushed back, Stanley Jacobs and Six Pack played, couples and singles danced with energy, and watchers feasted on a buffet as well as the sight of dancers.
The workshop, led by Dr. Johann Buis of the Center for Black Music Research staff and archivist Suzanne Flandreau, taught 11 residents how to go about interviewing long-time Crucian musicians and preserving their words and music. The training covered field research and explored ethical issues that may arise when recording the life stories of living musicians.
Carol Wakefield, librarian at the Whim Greathouse Library, hosted the group at Whim Plantation and taught part of the last session, providing research leads for interviewers to arm themselves with before approaching their subjects. She showed how historic information can be gleaned or surmised from close examination of early census and church records. The class, divided into three teams, set to with enthusiasm to delve into some of those records, and thus learned important questions to ask their subjects when they began interviews.
Attending the workshop were Sharisse Bascombe, Winifred Hardy, Beth Heyliger, Carol Jackson, Emeline Jackson, Marise James, Aretha "Ricki" Marshall, Azalea McBean, John Munro, Veronica Phillips and Steve Webster.
All are now armed with tape recorders and cameras supplied to workshop participants as part of the program. They will be interviewing subjects of their choosing over the next several months.
Attendees each receive $100 upon completion of the workshop, unlike the common practice of charging attendees for such a program. Once a project is submitted, the interviewer and the subject music-maker will each receive a $100 stipend.
The Education Department donated space at the Curriculum Center for the workshop, and UVI provided the facility for the summit through its co-sponsoring Social Sciences Division.
A similar workshop in "Documenting Living Treasures" was taught on St. Thomas last year, with a summit that honored Alwyn "Lad" Richards and James "Jamesie" Brewster of St. Thomas, Delita O'Connor of St. John, and Stanley Jacobs and Eldred Christian of St. Croix.
The Adams Music Research Institute facility on St. Thomas will be open to researchers of black music in the Caribbean once renovation is completed. It will house a resource center with Internet access and the entire body of Alton Adams' saved paper archives searchable through scans onto CD-ROMs. Martin Lamkin is the on-site AMRI program manager, and Shirley Lincoln is the resource center director.
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