Columbus incited the annihilation of the 3 million Taino people of Haiti. Happy day off!
Five hundred years later Alan Lomax visited Haiti to document the music of a displaced people. Anthropologically the music connects the polyrhythmic essentials behind blues and jazz with African music. Some historians argue that due to the nature of slavery in the Caribbean, African culture was not subject to the same paternalism as in America (where drumming was outlawed for fears of rebellion). Coupled with the successful rebellion that formed the first black republic in the world, music in Haiti remained distinctly African. By the time Lomax records this, the music evolved to include elements of Highlife and Cumbias. Musically this is sounds like early Cajun music, cumbias, Dominican merengues, and fife and drum. Harte Records 102 will be a ten CD box set of Lomax's Haitian field recordings. Here is a taste.
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