All the musical Voodoo you need – original music of sacred rituals from Haiti and beyond, adapted Jazz-concept albums and the imagined mysteries of Exotica Forget the clichés about Voodoo and throw everything you know about it from lms, books, and Pop-songs overboard before listening to the drums from Haiti, which form the most important ritual foundation for the Voodoo religion and its ceremonies. Voodoo was a syncretistic religion originating in West Africa originally, spreading via the slave trade across the Caribbean and Haiti to Louisiana in the Southern USA and South America. Merging with the European musical heritage, its rhythms formed the basis for many North American popmusical forms of the 20th century, such as jazz, blues, rhythm & blues, rock, funk and hip hop. In Haiti and some African states, Voodoo is a recognized state religion and is said to have 60 million followers today. Katherine Dunham (1909-2006) was an African-American pioneer who, as an anthropologist, dancer and choreographer, began travelling to Haiti in 1936 and intensively studied the music of the Caribbean; she probably also made the rst recordings there, which were to be released in the US as early as 1946. The singer and dancer Emy De Pradines (born in Haiti in 1918) was the rst to receive a recording contract in her home country. The original albums of master drummers like Ti Roro, Ti Marcel and Issa El Saieh demonstrate how this music developed in the 50s. In the United States, an Exotica-boom began in the mid-1950s, triggering a wide spectrum of recordings under the voodoo concept from jazz to easy listening. Hiding behind the alias Chaino the American drummer Leon Johnson (1927- 1999) made some recordings, which stayed rather close to the original rituals. Musically interesting are the Voodoo-productions with jazz musicians by Perez Prado, Shorty Rodgers, Don Ralke, Buddy Collette and, above all, Tito Puente. The last three CDs of this box set present the kings of Easy Listening, whose exotic soundtrack journeys into the world of Voodoo, comfortably enjoyed from the sofa of the futuristically furnished American middle-class apartment, a wellgroomed cocktail in hand, created a wonderful sound-wallpaper.
