Tag Archives | Barbados

A Tuk Band tearin’ it up

Our favorite tuk band from Barbados, is EVERY tuk band.

Landship is a tradition from Barbados that refers to both a dance performance group and an essential social-cultural community organization for the African-Barbadian community. Landships organize themselves into individual “ships,” named after British vessels, which unite into “fleets” under the leadership of “Lord High Admirals” and other “officers.” Landship performers will tell you they are not doing a dance; instead they are executing “manoeuvers” to the command of the Captain in the course of a parade. The primary musical “engine” of a landship is the Tuk Band, a drum/fiddle/triangle ensemble based upon British regimental military bands. In this video we hear “tuk” in action.

Ring Ting Ting

The Merrymen definitely want to make you smile. And, when you listen to “Ring Ting Ting,” smile you shall.

The Merrymen is a band from Barbados that became popular in the 1960s due to its happy, uptempo calpyso — a style that became known as “blue beat — its flamboyant troubadour costumes and the very merry whistling of lead singer Emile Straker. while you’re watching this slideshow featuring the best album covers ever.

Ragga Ragga Ragga Ragga Ragga Ragga Ragga Ragga Ragga Ragga Ragga

Does Red Plastic Bag rule Barbados…? You better believe it.

One of All Around This World’s favorite soca songs is “Ragga Ragga,” a mid-’90s Caribbean mega-hit by Bajan musician Stedson Wilshire, otherwise known as “Red Plastic Bag,” “RPB” or even just “Bag.” In the song RPB declares his general disdain for ragga music, in which deejays speak, sometimes incomprehensibly, over a pounding beat.

Don’t you dare call Barbados “Lesser”

This week in our online class we voyage to Barbados, a glorious island nation in the “Lesser Antilles.” Barbados had a long history even before the British arrived in 1625 to find it uninhabited. Amerindians had lived there in about 1600 BC, then the Arawak came-and then the Caribs, who ruled the roost for several hundred years until they disappeared, likely as a result of their encounters with Spanish and Portuguese visitors (and/or their germs). The island soon became a land full of wealthy sugar plantation owners and their African forced laborers. For the next three hundred years only the very wealthiest citizens of Barbados were allowed to vote, ensuring domination by those very wealthy citizens. Only in the 1950s did universal suffrage come to Barbados. In 1966 Barbados became independent.

We’re going to enjoy our swing-out to Barbados. There aren’t too many better places to be.

Why does our Landship plait a maypole?

We end our week in Barbados with the Barbados Landship Association. A popular Landship dance is the “plaiting” of a Maypole. The choreography of Landship often tells the story of the “Middle Passage,” the brutal transport of enslaved Africans across the Atlantic. In a favorite dance, eight dancers “plait a Maypole,” turning multi-colored ribbons around a maypole until they’re very short, then them unwinding again. This tradition connects dancers with West African stories of the clever Anansi, an eight-legged spider, who was said to have helped the Akan people learn to weave and build houses. Watch the Barbados Landship Association in action.

All Aboard the Landship!

Bajan landship is guaranteed cheer you up. (And you didn’t even know you were sad!)

Landship, a tradition unique to Barbados, developed during the several centuries of British rule as a way for African Barbadians to emulate (and also satirize) the strict hierarchies of the British navy while using playful dance moves to reference a harsh history of slavery and colonialism. A landship is a Barjan community dance society (“a ship on land”) whose members dress up like British naval officers and support staff and dance in processions like British naval officers do–sort of.

I am a Bajan

Many people in Barbados speak an inventive hybrid form of English known as Bajan. You know what All Around This World thinks about that? “Cheese on bread!”
Bajan speakers revel in the playful nature of Bajan phrasing and pronunciation. For example, Bajan speakers pronounce “th” as “d” (such as “dem” instead of “them), leave “to be” out of sentences (“I here” instead of “I am here”) and use the same word three times for emphasis. So, instead of “This music class is great!” a Bajan speaker (like our good friend RUPEE) may say, “Dis music class good good GOOD.”