Haitian Music - Haiti Observer Blog

She is a well to do musician who has been able to gain a lot from her career. Regine Chassagne was born in born 18 August 1977 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada where by Canadian-Haitian parents who had immigrated to Canada during the reign of president Duvalier who was a renowned dictator in the country facilitating the death of so many of the country's citizens and the fleeing of a larger group of people.

Regine Chassagne was thus raised in Canada where she also noticed her interests and talent in the music industry and was involved with a couple of bands where they did a couple of great hits. She then met Win Butler with whom they co-founded the band group arcade fire which was a huge success for them.

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Claude "Tico" Pasquet was a drummer and percussionist in Konpa music. He was born in Haitian family of music, where people like Dodof, Archibald, Alexandre, Jean and Andre came from. He developed drumming skills from his uncles Alexandre and Richard. He compared a drum to life in music because the drum made music sweet. He played in a group known as La Belle Etoile for two years and in 1967 his family migrated to New York.

His passion for music would not allow him to stay without singing so he joined another group known as Les Freres Sicot. This group made him to grow very fast in music and with time he started focusing on techniques of international drummers like Steve Gadd. In 1969 Claude "Tico" Pasquet joined a group of his own generation known as Babby Jazz and later Les Difficiles de New York. He was a skilled drummer whom everyone admired. He went back to Haiti in 1972 to play with Robert Martino in Les Gypsies but his unique drumming nature was noticed by all the fans.

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All that is known about him is that Claude G Cajuste is a lead guitarist from a Haitian band. The band he is part of is famous, though it has seen its better and worst days. He is an artist and a musician who utilizes her God given talent to the fullest without being ashamed of showcasing his talent.

The band's popularity grew 10 fold when star singer Ti Manno joined the band at the end of the 1970's. By the early 1980's Ti Manno came out with his own band, Gemini All Stars, with some young blood like Mario Germain on Bass, Ansyto Mercier on Keyboard, Patrick Casseus on Drums,Imgart Manigat vocal and Ti Claude Geffrard Cajuste on lead Guitar. After the album 'Expoitation" ironically the young blood left the band for unfair treatment by the manager who happened to be Ti Manno's wife herself.

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Frantz Casseus was born in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. He was a guitarist and a composer of classical and folk music which was more of traditional music. He discovered his passion of playing the guitar while he was young; he became the first guitarist in the island who would sing as a soloist and the same time play guitar.

Frantz Casseus created a niche of himself in music. At the age of 23 years he would perform classical music in concerts. He was no doubt a talented artist who would transform folk music of his country into expressions with meaning of his traditions. Singing folk songs of his own country limited him from getting good singers to back him up as he played the guitar, but this did not prevent him from prospering. His dream came to pass when he met Lolita Cuevas, the Puerto Rican-born who were vocalists from Haiti. He began collaboration with them as interpreters.

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Gerald Maxwell Rivera, born in Brooklyn, birthdate of May 23, 1973, is a Haitian-Puerto Rican neo-soul singer. Rivera, who goes by the stage name Maxwell, recorded his first album, Maxwell's Urban Hang Suite, with song composer Leon Ware and well-known guitarist Wah Wah Watson. The studio tracks were laid down in the early 1990s, but the album was not released until 1996, due to Columbia Records skittishness about its worth.

Columbia's reservations about Urban Hang Suite appeared correct, because audiences did not respond well, until the second single, "Ascension (Don't Ever Wonder)", caught fire and sold over 2,000,000 copies, achieving double-platinum success. Subsequently, the album became nominated for a Grammy Award. In June of 1997, Gerald Maxwell Rivera appeared on MTV Unplugged, performing his album material, along with Kate Bush's "This Woman's Work" and Nine Inch Nails' "Closer". Again, the artist and Columbia Records tangled over issuing an album of his MTV Unplugged concert, and ended up only issuing an EP.

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He is a Haitian born star that has been able to achieve much more than other musicians have in the past couple of years. Jean Alcindor was born and raised in Haiti where he established his career in the music industry and where he also got noticed by his fans and had a great time raising as a star. He is an old member of Skah Shah and was a great hit back then.

Jean Alcindor has ever since his childhood been attracted and interested in the music industry and has worked hard to ensure that he is able to raise to where he currently is by simply working to ensure that everything he does is a great hit in the industry. As such he has reached a height not reached by others and has been able to easily make it for the good of the country.

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Jean Herard Richard "Richie" is a talented composer, singer and a drummer. He was a member of Zenglen and was among the artist who gave tributes to over 300,000 Haitians who died from the earth quake in 2010.

Jean Herard Richard "Richie confirmed rumors that were spreading that he wanted to leave Zenglen group to be on his own because he thinks he will make more money. He seems to imitate Gazzman Couleur who left Nu look and formed his own band group. Rumors say that he will be joined by some members of Zenglen and Gazzman Couleur.

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Jean Michel Daudier is a popular musician in Haiti. Born in a family of Musicians and poets, Jean learned to play the guitar at a tender age of 15 years. Jean Michel became famous in 1986.

This was after he wrote a protest song called "Lem pa we soley la" which when translated means 'When I don't see the Sunshine.' The song supported the fight against the former dictator Baby Doc in Haiti. The song was contentious and this made people find themselves in cells for singing it.

Jean Michel Daudier has expanded his musical styles and now he possesses an ability to convey strong emotions through the beautiful music he writes. He sets scenes and moods with his beautiful playing and also in his way of writing intensely personal and vivid lyrics. This has made him travel to many countries. He also performed at the Broward Performing Art Center for Martin Luther king Jr birthday Celebrations.

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Arly Lariviere is American- Haitian musician. He loved music since his hay days, but this passion for music came from his father and Tropicana D'Haiti. This passion developed greatly making him come up with Nu look group. He played the role of a conductor of Nu look group for 11 years. Lariviere was a talented musician who enjoyed Haitian music.

He has made an attempt to resign from Nu look group due to some circumstances, but this became impossible due to his love for his fans. His fans claimed to lose morale of Nu look group if he resigned, and his resignation would affect the members of Nu look and their dependants. Due to his value for his fans Arly Lariviere chose to remain the group for the time being.

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Bemol Telfort was born and bred in Port Au Prince, Haiti. He was song writer, singer, guitarist, bassist, conga player, composer arranger and bandleader. Growing up in Haiti where there are many artists made him admire singing. At the age of six he started playing Conga which he did till the age of 8 where he used body percussion. Since he had no money to buy a guitar, he made himself one at the age of 10 years.

His guitar was unique, though it lacked some scales like c major. Telfort attempted to come up with a guitar with c major scale. To achieve this he bought various guitar books that he came across. To earn a living he played conga, breathing percussion instrument and his own made guitar.

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