The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #11475 Message #1860228
Posted By: M.Ted
16-Oct-06 - 09:08 AM
Thread Name: What is Zydeco?
Subject: RE: What is Zydeco?
So there were a lot of Yoruba speakers listening to Zydeco music? and they borrowed the word, only misunderstood what it meant, and, instead of "beans" they thought that it meant "ritual"? Ooookay.
Me, Myself, I think that the Zydeco music is more likely than not marginally connected to voudou, and that the word "zydeco" is an artifact, like" Jockomo fi na ne"--And I once asked the Wild Tchoupitoulas what that meant, and they didn't know. They didn't really know much about where the flag rituals had come from, either, except of course that the were part of Mardi Gras tradition. This was back in the late 70's, when nobody outside of a few places had even heard the music, let alone the word "Zydeco"--
This was in the Bay Area--in Richmond, there were a lot of families from Louisiana who'd come to build ships in WWII-so there were resident Zydeco bands, including Queen Ida, and La performers, like Clifton and Cleveland Chenier played in the area as well.