Jamaican Songs
: URING last year I had occasion praise Cy Grant's singing of the | Calypsos which, like most folk music, | made a direct appeal to me. Since then | the BBC has followed up this line with | a programme of Jamaican songs by | Louise Bennett faultlessly accompanied | by Cy Grant. Miss Bennett, a woman of great vitality, obviously close in spirit to the people whose work she sung, ushered in each song at the same breakneck speed with which a woman tells her neighbour of something exciting just down the road. Her _ pronunciation tended to flatten "I’ve" into "Ah’ve," and her singing voice was more notable for the accuracy with which she kept to the rhythm of a harsh melodic line than for fine tone or range. To my mind this was exactly suited to the nature of the material she was handling. Miss Bennett closed her recital effectively by giving an impression of the music of a strange heretical Christian sect, as with drum and voice they might be heard advancing down the street past the door of your house and on into the distance. |
Westcliff
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/NZLIST19540122.2.16.8
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New Zealand Listener, Volume 30, Issue 757, 22 January 1954, Page 9
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186Jamaican Songs New Zealand Listener, Volume 30, Issue 757, 22 January 1954, Page 9
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Copyright in the work University Entrance by Janet Frame (credited as J.F., 22 March 1946, page 18), is owned by the Janet Frame Literary Trust. The National Library has been granted permission to digitise this article and make it available online as part of this digitised version of the New Zealand Listener. You can search, browse, and print this article for research and personal study only. Permission must be obtained from the Janet Frame Literary Trust for any other use.
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