The Fading Cajun Culture (Part III)

plans for the upcoming run dr. Barry Aunt Sally a member of this group explains the meaning behind the tradition this Mardi Gras remedy run is one of many that you still find in south Louisiana is in little towns and rural settings and they are all the descendants of the the notion of Mardi Gras that came across the Atlantic from Europe in our case from France when the settlers first came here they came here with a sense of Mardi Gras just as they came here with a sense of Christmas or Easter or anything else in the liturgical calendar they would have noticed on the calendar you know what day it was they would have celebrated Good Friday or Easter or Christmas or New Year's Day and and Mardi Gras was one of those things on the calendar we had I've observed Mardi Gras in about 30 different versions in south Louisiana at the rural mark or not the urban carnival and they're all they all have essential differences but at the same time if you look at them you recognize them all as Mardi Gras so they all have a a very firm sense of identity as well and that identity is what comes from France the difference is is what you are what evolved here and I think what's recognized with Mardi Gras battlements that they're all begging processions they're gather together to move through your community defining it as you go through it and asking for something and giving the performance in exchange for the gift and not only is there solidarity in the group but you create solidarity about people you visit too because we invite them all to the dance right anybody who gives us something we're all invited to the dance and of course the playfulness the inversion the turning turning reality inside out and upside down just for a moment so that it it generates a sense of festivities for this Jennings group of gentlemen this is more than just another holiday this is about family tradition and strikes at the heart of each member Thomas des Eaux tell this year's captain is filled with emotion as he explains how this run once fading has become strong again most love of anything and it's it almost died and we brought it back through all the other captains and we had Wallace we had Lee cause well John every Edward sure Terry Francis Bobby Lou beer and now it's me at one time Pete Gary was a part of this and he had asked me not to let this die at all so we brought it back and I got with Wilson I got with John I got with the older ones and we brought it back what it is dick what it is today and like I said I'm the captain now but it wouldn't be for everybody behind me it would be nothing but they the backbone of it with me and like this it is so it's a family thing and it just everybody loves it but I just it gets a part of me in my family at this point in time there's going to be four generations running my dad was just sitting next to me here I have a son next over there and on behalf of grandson this could be righted and myself so there'll be four generations this is something that we have you know been doing for quite a few years also have four brothers that ride one of us here I have nephews that and there's so much doesn't steal from him and from tradition and what what it really means to us as the Cajun culture has been we live that's that's it's not something that just comes today this is something that we live every day it's a lot of work but it's a lot of fun and whenever weird they're together it's a family not all the immediate family but his family that live across the street their sons and their grandsons it's a family that gets together and have a great time Hoddy Gras day over to to Solano the Fond du bateau Mardi Gras day event to the lotto Ponte lube and launder tiny more shared emotion you can launder time to tell to the pontiff a no Mardi Gras competative through tala to the pontiff al-mahdi got a party to to solitude Avanti you when I was growing up into music I'd be 65 6 or 6 years old so I was more than 45 by the time I was actually started hearing the music probably been about six seven years old it was primarily just the fiddle the guitar in the accordion my first fiddle and made myself I would have masterpiece was made out of a cigar box screen wire sewing thread viewable and a piece of rosin of a pine tree otherwise you don't have it don't have rotten egg okay and it sounded really bad so I had to pour biotin later on about one from money shared Montgomery Ward $19 thing in those days and it did good later on I got something a bit better now but four and that's enough oh I've said you can't play for the same time I said we know what I can take turn you know the jobs like that Jim but my oldest one waited 8 bed in 1813 it come out of Germany or World War two my oldest brother in law went through Normandy got wounded in the leg and when he got into Germany an old man give violin for two bowls of candy and glory back to me I say something else too for me and mr. Traeger it sounds so beautiful and I promised him money how he died some time back but I promised him I'd never sell it I I got to rent son and my oldest one about 13 14 dating now he's taking lessons so he'd probably wind up with but I don't sell but he can have it and some of the songs I heard back back win back day in that in the day were actually some of the songs that's played today a lot of things have changed in the music you know we hit we have we have everything is done electronically now you know they have electronic based electronic fit Oh electronic guitars electronic steel guitars back in the day where everything was more or less acoustic gold authentic Cajun song you don't hear who are them sometime there's your Cajun music's like any other music has changed a little bit your country music exchange your Cajun music in my day was there were no amplification no nothing got a fiddle got in commute or and a trying that with it now everything is all amplified everything else you know and and they take a Cajun country tional and Mecca Cajun song out of it what I did want to go is one that's called salvation through Jude or any Asian mean work is too hard but I remember even as a boy the north side of life yet they had they had a club name the name of the club was called Webb's neighborhood lounge and had a low bar circle I must have been I don't know eight nine ten years old and every Sunday afternoon about Cajun band there this is a big deal it's the old old kind of Cajun dancehall that had all the bottle cats would use is a shell and gravel on the road to cook to fill the potholes and I remember they had a bouncer that would park the cars and I get runoff every Sunday from Webb's neighborhood lunch I say every Sunday it was probably the first two times I was there from what I remember about the place had a little window and he was part of the corner I was all I would always remember where he was and I would go around the building to the windows or to the side door so I could hear the music I'm thinking back in that day I can't remember for sure but I'm thinking Gosling or like Lawrence Walker Aldous Roche in Nathan afshar and all those guys were playing there I just didn't recognize I just didn't know who they were but I knew it was the music that I loved or was loving at the time and so when they when the the bouncer would catch me it he didn't know how to speak English he says uh I just I've actually seen get out of here get out of here and so one son he caught me and he says and he couldn't speak when he says how come we come here all the time like that you know in the real Cajun accent and then I realized oh he didn't realize I spoke French and when I told him he was even because that's why he was asking me in English he says why you come here had the trouble that you have a Sunday and I told him in French Oscar's Emlyn music is because I love the music then he tells me says oh mighty people near Tunis from v ctv ctv abba you can come every Sunday if you want no he said I just thought you wanted to I guess in so many words just being kind of mischievous and that was the only reason I was there and so I got to as long as a webs neighborhood lounge was there I got to hear the music that's no Cajun song authentic that is called Toledo Paulo man in the any logical aura that means two boys in love with the same girl neither one gets her that taught him a lesson you know do that we you know do it before was was my friend and mentor when I finally got to meet him at the Main Street lounge just anyone looking at this room you could say well this kid wants to spend his whole life in boards but it's not it's not the whole truth that's where I first started actually playing out to where other people would listen to me as the main street lounge in Bastille when I went there the first time I thought I thought I'd died and went to a Cajun musicians heaven that was Nathan apps are there there was a young Steve Riley that was doing ball far there was all the people who I thought were gods - the music was actually at a jam session and then I started going there every Thursday after that he used to always tell me that the music he did raela music till I called kitchen local to swan song it's the music is is the glue that holds the culture together they said without the music there's no way that we could we could hold the culture together so anybody always tell me that it was the music was the glue and this kids 12 years old he plays like he's 80 years old he plays like he's been playing for 70 years and me being an old musician say how great is this you know this is one of the greatest things I've ever seen and and one of the guys that always come to the jam he says our victory is off Hong Kong shoppers really music no culture of our memoria it's when we see kids that young playing traditional Cajun music our culture will never die and of course he said it with tears in his eyes because he left it the the culture so much but I said tell me kids you know you may not want to play the music but there's a music that's going to live on and on and on traditional Cajun music is going to live because got people like me that are crazy so much in love with the music that we're going to see that it that it survives people like ray Landry and many others that willingly give of their time to teach a new generation how to play Cajun music or one example of how the heritage will continue programs like Kota Phil's French immersion are showing progress children need to be encouraged to speak French at home and in the community until it becomes a part of their identity other areas such as living off the land by fishing hunting and trapping or simply not financially feasible so then to what extent will the culture survive this is a matter of debate but the Cajun culture has developed over some 350 years enduring unthinkable hardships given its history the culture will find a way to survive you

Channel: Ray Breaux

Views: 90,534

Rating: 4.9364519 out of 5

Keywords: Cajun, Cajun Culture, Acadian, French, acadian culture

Id: U3O95WIT2Iw

Length: 16min 44sec (1004 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 31 2016