From the West Indies

New Zealand Listener, Volume 17, Issue 438, 14 November 1947, Page 11

From the West Indies

ERTHA RAWLINSON recently gave a splendid recital of songs which were decidedly "different," when from 4YA she sang six West Indian songs, some of them pure~spirituals and others of the folk-song and calypso type: This programme is well worth detailing in full. It began with two spirituals, "Death, QO Me Lawd" and "Mercy Pourin’ Down," both of which are fit to rank in religious fervour and simple but effective melodic line with any of the great Negro spirituals. The song "Time for Men Go Home" was prefaced by an explanation not without timely and local ‘ application "in these days of: strikes; it seems to have been sung by Negro workers as a gentle reminder that the overseer had forgotten to give the signal to "knock off work’-the same gentle type of hinting which Haydn ‘managed in the Farewell symphony. It seemed no effort for the singer to turn from the melancholy splendour of the spirituals to the folk songs, "Murder in de Market," "Ogoun Belele," and "Papa Didn’t Know." She indicatéd in

a style both affectionate and zestful the _ idiosyncracies of the original singers of these songs, songs in ‘which often a seemingly naive turn of phrase overlies a someWhat barbaric code of morals and behaviour ("Oh, I ain’t killed nobody but my husband!" for instance). Altogether this was one of the best recitals 4YA has given us for a long time, both in the choice of original songs and in the very fine renderings.