A Heart of Love for Culture and Music

I fall into the arms of love every time music fills the air and I am blessed with the opportunity to enjoy it. I am left with a cheerful disposition and a sunny temperament; especially when I can experience the great reward of performing songs that I wrote.

It is not every day that I am bursting in creativity. There are times when I have writer’s block and it kills me in so many ways. I can make up a cacophony of excuses for the days when trying to put words to the paper does not happen in the manner I would like, but at those moments when a flood of good thoughts just doesn’t seem to push through, there is nothing I can do to change that. It just happens. 

But then in that season of your life, someone comes along and inspires you with an idea and boom, there you go with a feeling of empowerment that allows you to once again, regain control of the writing process and productivity happens. I guess such was the case with the song my mom asked me to write. 

She had this confident expectation that a song would come out of her mere request. I guess the intention and hope that I had of being able to fulfill it was all I needed to be able to write Saut D’eau Song, a song about a region in Haiti where one of the most beautiful waterfalls in the world lives. 

The words came like an army of love, marching with intention to tear down the mountain that once blocked the free flow of words and at that particular moment, had a burning need to be released. If you are interested, you can check out the original tune here: https://open.spotify.com/track/6OgJmDcNvmBdnQzoNwOkp7?si=bILPJgF3SiObfMI92URzUw

I will admit that it was a bit different for me to write a song like this and I still can’t say why I had never intentionally written about the Haitian culture that was introduced to me as a child and that I grew up coming to know. But this tune gave me a reason to go deeper into my thoughts, share my own experiences about a place I had seen with my own eyes and confidently share a bit of my identity and story. And so, you can say it was a spirited event to actually perform this song live with my band for the first time. 

To grow up in the margins of cross-culturalization is to know a bit of more than one cultural background, practice the mores and behavioral patterns from a bit of each yet to dance to the beat of where you are, because you are there. But to be able to share a piece of what makes you different with people from all walks of life in the atmosphere of a musical gathering, and without fearing being exactly who you are, feels good. 

All I can say is that if you see a beatific smile across my face, it is because the other evening, under the brilliant sparkle of the moon, I turned the musical focus of interest to Haiti and shared a glamorized view of my ancestor’s home through song and had appreciable results. Drums by Richie Johnson echoed through the room as Kenny Alston plucked his bass with fierceness, Prrrl tickled the ivories with peculiar phraseology and Herb Lewis added a nice shaft of light with his saxophone which made me sing my lyrics with a heart of love. Together we performed this song for the first time at Silvana which is located in the Harlem section of New York and I would so love it if you would check it out here.The song is called Saut D’Eau Song and this is the live version that I was telling you about: https://youtu.be/Lls4VddAe_8

Thank you for allowing me to enthrall your attention to the detailed content of my story for just a bit. I admit that I can be a bit dramatic when reporting the good things that happened to me in my daily life, but such is the art of conversation. 

I hope my words did not meet you with a frozen silence, a blank gaze or find you determined to reach to the end of this post without any interest for what was being discussed but rather, that it reproduced a blossom of joy through your mental boundary in some way or another. Everybody is full of opinions which is something that cannot be avoided, I know. Yet still I hope that yours of me, based on this post was a good one. 

I must thank you for allowing this interlude from your song and dance, to waltz into the seductive tempo that is my life. Much love and respect to you!