From May 17 – 25, students from the Jazz Studies Program at Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, MI, USA immersed in Dominican culture, music and Caribbean living. Create Caribbean Research Institute had the honour of partnering with WMU’s band Mas Que Nada (MQN) as part of the Jazz and Creole Exchange Program, which culminated in the band’s performance at one of Dominica’s major festivals, Jazz n’ Creole, on Sunday May, 24.<\/p>\n
Members of the band got to experience first-hand the traditional musical sounds of Dominica, with Jing Ping tutorials (including dance lessons) provided by the Flamboyant Cultural Group of Dublanc, and later learned African drumming techniques from cultural practitioners, RasMo Moses and Gregory Rabess. MQN also got to attend some of the fringe events of the Jazz n’ Creole week, including a film screening of the 2004 production of Martinique, Biguine, which tells the story of the blending of African\/Creole folk and traditional French musical sounds during the late 19th Century.<\/p>\n\n\t\t