Bouyon (pronunciation: ''boo-your'') is a genre of Dominican music that originated in

Dominica Dominica, officially the Commonwealth of Dominica, is an island country in the Caribbean. It is part of the Windward Islands chain in the Lesser Antilles archipelago in the Caribbean Sea. The capital, Roseau, is located on the western side of t ...

in the late 1980s. Prominent bouyon groups include

Windward Caribbean Kulture The WCK Band (Windward Caribbean Kulture) was formed in 1988 in Dominica.Thompson, Keith (2010) ''Caribbean Islands: The Land and The People'', New Africa Press, , p. 187 The band played a blend of the local Cadence-lypso and traditional Jing pi ...

(WCK); Roots, Stems and Branches (RSB); and First Serenade. "Hardcore bouyon", also called "Gwada-Bouyon," is another type of bouyon, different to the Dominican genre which began through musical collaborations between citizens of Dominica and Guadeloupe, who both speak

Antillean Creole Antillean French Creole (also known as Lesser Antillean Creole, Kreyol, or Patois) is a French-based creole languages, French-based creole language that is primarily spoken in the Lesser Antilles caribbean. Its grammar and vocabulary include ele ...

. The term ''bouyon'' means something akin to "

gumbo Gumbo () is a stew that is popular among the U.S. Gulf Coast community, the New Orleans stew variation being the official state cuisine of the U.S. state of Louisiana. Gumbo consists primarily of a strongly flavored stock, meat or shellfis ...

soup" or "coubouyon poisson" (a typical Caribbean dish) in

. Bouyon music is a mix of traditional and modern music, and is popular across much of the Caribbean.

Origin

Bouyon blends

jing ping Jing Ping is a kind of folk music originated on the slave plantations of Dominica, also known colloquially as an accordion band. Dominican folk music, jing ping bands accompany a circle dance called the flirtation, as well as the Dominican quadr ...

cadence-lypso Cadence-lypso is a fusion of cadence rampa from Haiti, Jazz, Blues and calypso music, calypso from Trinidad and Tobago that has also spread to other English speaking countries of the Caribbean. Originated in the 1970s by the Dominican band Exil ...

and traditional dances, namely

bèlè Bel Air (, ) is a neighborhood of Port-au-Prince, Haiti. It is a slum area of the city and suffers from poverty. Crime is widespread, and kidnappings and killings have created panic among the local population. The neighborhood is also noted for h ...

quadrille The quadrille is a dance that was fashionable in late 18th- and 19th-century Europe and its colonies. The quadrille consists of a chain of four to six ''Contra dance, contredanses''. Latterly the quadrille was frequently danced to a medley of ope ...

, chanté mas and lapo kabwit,

mazurka The Mazurka ( Polish: ''mazurek'') is a Polish musical form based on stylised folk dances in triple meter, usually at a lively tempo, with character defined mostly by the prominent mazur's "strong accents unsystematically placed on the seco ...

zouk Zouk is a musical movement and dance pioneered by the French Antillean band Kassav' in the early 1980s. It was originally characterized by a fast tempo (120–145 bpm), a percussion-driven rhythm, and a loud horn section. Musicians from Mart ...

and other styles of

Caribbean music Caribbean music genres are very diverse. They are each synthesis of African, European, Asian and Indigenous influences, largely created by descendants of African enslaved people (see Afro-Caribbean music), along with contributions from other c ...

Offshoots

Jump up

In 1987, Exile One recorded a Chanté mas and Lapo Kabwit song, "L'hivernage", commonly referred to as the yo. The French Antilleans referred to the beat as "jump up music" because of its carnival style sound. This jump upbeat was later modified to become bouyon or modern soca music. (As printed on Exile One's album "creole attitude"). In

Guadeloupe Guadeloupe is an Overseas departments and regions of France, overseas department and region of France in the Caribbean. It consists of six inhabited islands—Basse-Terre Island, Basse-Terre, Grande-Terre, Guadeloupe, Grande-Terre, Marie-Galant ...

and

Martinique Martinique ( ; or ; Kalinago language, Kalinago: or ) is an island in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies, in the eastern Caribbean Sea. It was previously known as Iguanacaera which translates to iguana island in Carib language, Kariʼn ...

, "Jump up" refers generally to bouyon music.

Bouyon Soca

Bouyon soca is a fusion-genre that blends bouyon and

soca music Soca music, or the "soul of calypso", is a genre of music that originated in Trinidad and Tobago in the 1970s. It is considered an offshoot of Calypso music, calypso, with influences from Afro–Trinidadians and Tobagonians, Afro-Trinidadian a ...

Bouyon-muffin

A modern offshoot of bouyon is bouyon-muffin. It combines elements of Jamaican raggamuffin music,

hip hop Hip-hop or hip hop (originally disco rap) is a popular music genre that emerged in the early 1970s from the African-American community of New York City. The style is characterized by its synthesis of a wide range of musical techniques. Hip- ...

, and

dancehall Dancehall is a genre of Jamaican popular music that originated in the late 1970s. Initially, dancehall was a more sparse version of reggae than the roots reggae, roots style, which had dominated much of the 1970s.Barrow, Steve & Dalton, Peter (2 ...

. The most influential figure in the development of bouyon-muffin is "Skinny Banton" (now known as "Shadowflow") who from 1995 collaborated with the WCK band, using

ragga Raggamuffin music (or simply ragga) is a subgenre of dancehall and reggae music. The instrumentals primarily consist of electronic music with heavy use of sampling. Wayne Smith's " Under Mi Sleng Teng", produced by King Jammy in 1985 on a ...

influenced vocals to

chant A chant (from French ', from Latin ', "to sing") is the iterative speaking or singing of words or sounds, often primarily on one or two main pitches called reciting tones. Chants may range from a simple melody involving a limited set of no ...

on top of bouyon rhythms. Songs like "party" ft Joanne with Bucktown sounds' DJ Cut gave the products of bouyon muffin like Bushtown clan, a further inspiration to incorporate more hip-hop and dancehall into the Bouyon-muffin genre to create "reketeng".

Reketeng

Reketeng is a style of bouyon based on sampling. It remixed existing Dancehall and Hip-Hop recordings over Bouyon instrumentals. DJ Cut and the creation of Reketeng gave rise to Dominica Dj's experimenting bouyon with other genres and created a new wave in the

music of Dominica The music of Dominica includes a variety of genres including all the popular genres of the world. Popular music is widespread, with a number of native Dominican performers gaining national fame in imported genres such as calypso, reggae, soca, ...

. Like

dub music Dub is a musical style that grew out of reggae in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It is commonly considered a subgenre of reggae, though it has developed to extend beyond that style.Dub: soundscapes and shattered songs in Jamaican reggae, p.&nb ...

, reketeng consists predominantly of instrumental

remixes A remix, also sometimes called reorchestration or rework, is a piece of media which has been altered or contorted from its original state by adding, removing, or changing pieces of the item. A song, piece of artwork, book, poem, or photograph ca ...

of existing recordings and is achieved by significantly altering the recordings, usually by removing the beat from an existing music piece and emphasizing the bouyon drum and bass parts. This stripped-down track is sometimes referred to as a '

riddim In Jamaican dancehall music, a riddim is the instrumental accompaniment to a song and is synonymous with the rhythm section. Jamaican music genres that use the term consist of the ''riddim'' plus the ''voicing'' (vocal part) sung by the deeja ...

Bouyon gwada

Due to the popularity of bouyon bands who toured the

French Antilles The French West Indies or French Antilles (, ; ) are the parts of France located in the Antilles islands of the Caribbean: * The two Overseas department and region of France, overseas departments of: ** Guadeloupe, including the islands of Bass ...

, an offshoot of bouyon from

is called bouyon gwada.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bouyon Music 20th-century music genres 21st-century music genres Music of Dominica