Yunduya Weyu

About 10 years ago, Belizian producer Ivan Duran was recording an album of male singers in the Afro-Central American, Garifuna tradition.  He noticed that the women singing backup actually knew many more of the traditional Garifuna songs than the male stars.  With that insight, Duran began collecting recordings, songs, ideas, and artists for what eventually became this album, a collection of women’s songs produced with a decidedly pop—rather than folkloric—aesthetic.  Umalali is a companion to Watina, the brilliant and widely acclaimed 2007 release Duran produced for the most famous Garifuna singer, the late Andy Palacio.  The band, the Garifuna Collective, is the same.  And Duran uses the same creative, tasteful layerings of guitars, additional voices and percussion, and flavors from Afro-Latin, reggae, Afropop and other styles to arrive at superbly well-imagined roots pop.

Garifuna songs are normally sung unaccompanied, or accompanied by two, stick-played drums, segundo (accompaniment) and primero (lead).  The nice thing about what Duran is doing is that there are no rules.  He is free to spin Silvia Blanco’s rendition of “Fuleisei (Favours)” with a racing, flamenco or north Africa feel, or “Barübnaa Yagian (Take Me Away)” as jaunty, guitar Afropop, or “Uruwei (The Government)” as slow blues.  Of course, there are examples of Garifuna party music, paranda, like “Yüdünya Weyu (The Sun Has Set),” in which Sofia Blanco’s mournful tale of a difficult childbirth contrasts deliciously with the song’s chugging beat.  And there is one nod to the one established Garifuna pop genre, high energy Punta Rock.  That’s Elodia Nolberto’s “Tuguchili Elia (Elia’s Father)” an open letter to a traveling husband, rendered with funky chippy-chop guitar that interweaves percussion in a way reminiscent of mbalax from Senegal.

One of the most haunting of these 12 short, distinctive songs is “Anaha Ya (Here I Am),” with Chila Torres singing lead and guitarist Eduardo “Guayo” overlaying blues tinged cross rhythms.  The near military drive of the drums and the strength of the voices communicates a sense of toughness, uncompromising forbearance, as a woman laments rumors that she is selling her daughter into prostitution.  The ten lead vocalists here all have voices the exude experience and character.  Fifty-four year old Sofia Blanco and her daughter Silvia are particularly impressive, the mother’s voice robust and earthy, the daughter’s warm and sunny, but no less powerful.

Duran has set himself a difficult task.  He is presenting the songs of women unaccustomed to the life and identity of a “professional musician,” and while he is ultimately aiming at a pop album, he must be careful not to distort or denature the spare, simple songs and performances of the women.  That he succeeds so well says much about his skill as a producer.  It also offers hope that we are seeing the dawn of a new roots music surge among the Garifuna of Belize, Honduras, and Guatemala.  This was Andy Palacio’s mission before his sudden death in January, 2008—an event strangely foreshadowed by this CD’s mournful final track, “Lirun Biganute (Sad News).”  Umalali provides substantive hope that Palacio’s work will go on, and that better days lie ahead for long neglected Garifuna music and musicians.

Contributed by: Banning Eyre for www.afropop.org