COUNTRY: Trinidad & Tobago
LANGUAGE: English
GENRE: Calypso
Found on the Smithsonian Folkways CD, “Hellish Calypso.” Today in the U.S. we may limbo at a wedding reception or during a dance competition at a roller skating rink, but limbo actually began in Trinidad as an African-inspired dance performed at wakes, with the downward motion symbolizing the descent of Africans into the hold of slave ships.
Lyrics of original and All Around This World version:
I want somebody to limbo like me. Limbo, limbo like me.
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