Haitian Encounter: Traditional Vodou Songs Collected by Georges Vilson

The eminent Haitian singer and song collector, Georges Vilson, introduces his Kandelab project for notating and recording Haitian songs used in vodou. For over 10 years, he has painstakingly collected Vodou songs and lyrics offered by friends and acquaintances. In spite of the hundreds if not thousands of recorded pieces of Vodou and other traditional rhythms, musical notations memorializing Haiti's music for posterity were exceedingly rare. Mr. Vilson has chosen Brooklyn Haitian singers to demonstrate a number of the songs, accompanied by drums and bass and will demonstrate the foundational role that singing plays in Haitian oral traditions and why the voice is one of Haiti's most important instruments.

THIS EVENT IS PRESENTED AS PART OF:

Brooklyn Arts Council’s The Sweetest Song Festival (TSS), is a month long focus on Brooklyn’s traditional singers and song styles. From April 26 through May 27, The Sweetest Song will present 12 concerts and 8 singing master classes at various Brooklyn venues. The programs will explore a range of singing traditions as practiced and performed in Brooklyn’s immigrant and diaspora communities and engage New Yorkers in a creative, cross-cultural exchange with some of the finest traditional singers living in Brooklyn.