Roy Cape

Danse, leve, choffe: it’s nearly time to hit the Creole music “gwoove” in Woseau, Domnik for the lucky pou toumoun 13th annual World Creole Music Festival (WCMF).

Established in 1997 by the late cultural entrepreneur Eddie Toulon, WCMF has provided a platform for Creole cultural solidarity, both within the region and the diasporas. Like unique Dominica, the festival stands alone in the Anglophone Caribbean as a celebration of indigenous cultures. Where else can one hear Jing Ping—the funky folk music which ruled village dances long before dancehall was skanked on—or watch the Kalinago dance? Where outside Paris, Kinshasha or Montreal can one let one’s hips loose to the sinuous river flow of Congolese rumba and soukous or yanvalou to Vodou Roots bands like Boukman Eksperyans, zoukez with Kassav who celebrate 30 years this year, or slow konpa with veteran Haitian band Tabou Combo?

Over the years, WCMF has hosted Cajun and Zydeco stars from Louisiana, Cuban soneros and salseros and timberos; konpa kings from Haiti, New York and Miami; soukous legends Sakis, Loketo, Diblo Dibala; reggae cubs Morgan Heritage, Aswad, and Maxi Priest. Let’s not forget the contribution Eastern Caribbean soca has made to WCMF, as the festival is utilising its 13th edition to honour one of the region’s musical icons: T&T’s Roy Cape. Cape and his ubiquitous All Stars have been backing young guns like Machel, Shurwayne, Iwer and Blaax, along with older heads like the Mighty Shadow, whenever they have hit the boards at Roseua’s Festival City. As WCMF director Val Cuffie notes, Roy Cape, who celebrates 50 years in the business of music making this year, is a living link to the former era of the big band, which has nurtured generations of Caribbean musicians.

Together with the late Byron Lee of Jamaica, who for many years was a fixture at Trinidad’s carnival, Roy Cape has been brass-blasting stages from London to Miami, Kingston to Roseau, leading from the front with his burnished sax. T&T nationals will have the chance to go support one of their own and see how much Roy Cape is venerated throughout the region. Besides mountain chicken, Kubuli beer, Boiling Lakes and Valleys of Desolation, in Dominica visitors can treat their dancing feet to the likes of Kassav, Haiti’s latest hottest konpa property Alan Cave and Zin; sweet scurrilous Mickey, the man who has made dropping his pants onstage a regular feature of his act; Cuba’s La Perfecta, local legends Swingin Stars, songbird Michele Henderson; reggae rampers Morgan Heritage and Maxi Priest and last, but never least, the Roy Cape All Stars. WCMF runs from October 30 to November 1.