High res photos of BeauSoleil avec Michael Doucet posted
on Flickr.
Congratulations to
BeauSoleil avec Michael Doucet, who received a Grammy
in the Zydeco/Cajun Category for the CD
Live at the 2008 New Orleans
Jazz &
Heritage Festival, presented Feb. 8, 2009, in Los
Angeles. This was the second year that the category has
been in existence. Over the years, BeauSoleil has
received 10 Grammy nominations. In 1997, the band won
the first Grammy ever given to a Cajun band when the CD
L'amour ou la Folie won in the Best Traditional
Folk Album category. In early 2009 BeauSoleil released a
new CD, Alligator Purse (photos of the CD release
party at the Blue Moon are posted in the Flickr
collection at the link provided above).
Click here for more information
on the CD.
Click here for information
on Jimmy Breaux and Friends: Live at Festivals Acadiens, released in 2008. |
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Smithsonian Folkways releases 2008
Michael Doucet CD From Now On
From
Now On,
Michael Doucet’s first recording on the Smithsonian
Folkways label, is the product of studio sessions, but
everything is laid-back and casual, the way musicians
groove alone or together at home just for their own
pleasure, playing whatever moves them.
Click here for more information. |
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BeauSoleil avec
Michael Doucet celebrates 30 years |
The top two rows of photos were
taken at Festivals Acadiens in Lafayette Oct. 15, 2006,
during the BeauSoleil Review, which included past
members of the group like accordionists Bessyl Duhon and
Errol Verret. The other photos were taken at the final
Louisiana Crossroads series performance of BeauSoleil at
the Liberty Theater in Eunice, Nov. 18, 2006. Shown in
the bottom photo, from left, are Michael Doucet, Billy
Ware, Jimmy Breaux, David Doucet, Tommy Alesi, and Mitch
Reed. Click on thumbnails to access larger photos. |
2006 was the the 30th anniversary
year of BeauSoleil avec Michael Doucet. Probably the
most musically adventurous of all Cajun bands,
BeauSoleil has drawn on, or Cajunized, many musical
traditions, but they remain fundamentally Cajun to the
core. As the liner notes to their 2006 CD demonstrate,
the band's list of "influences and masters they've
worked directly with reads like an encyclopedia of Cajun
cultural history" and also includes legendary Creole
musicians. BeauSoleil began
their fourth decade Live in Louisiana, the title
of a CD recorded at the
Louisiana
Crossroads series performances in New Iberia and
Lafayette in early January 2006. The CD presents the
best of BeauSoleil: original compositions by Michael
Doucet, including "Chanson d'Acadie," "Bunk's Blues" (a
tribute to the trumpeter Bunk Johnson), "Conja [New
Orleans 1786]," "Newz Reel," "Quelle Belle Vie," and "L'Ouragon"
(about an 1893 hurricane that washed away
Chenière Caminada).
Also featured are BeauSoleil's versions of "Flammes
d'enfer," "Ti Monde," "Bye Bye Boozoo," "Freeman's
Zydeco" (Michael Doucet's lyrics set to music by Freeman
Fontenot), and two Dennis McGee reels, "Tasso/One-Step
de McGee'."
For more information about the CD,
go to
www.waydowninlouisiana.com.
Posted 12-21-06 |
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Michael Doucet
and BeauSoleil in 2005
In 2005, Michael Doucet, is one of twelve
artists who have been awarded the prestigious
National Heritage Fellowship by The
National Endowment for the Arts. Beausoleil’s 2004 CD
Gitane Cajun was nominated for
a Grammy in the Best Traditional Folk Album--the group's 10th
Grammy nomination (BeauSoleil won in 1997).
Click here for more
photos from the group's appearance in downtown Baton Rouge in
May 2005. |
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Michael Doucet is pictured, top,
performing at the Liberty Theater during a special tribute to Amédé Ardoin and Dennis
McGee, and playing at Downtown Alive in Lafayette in 1999. The next two shots were both
taken during performances in Eunice by the Savoy-Doucet Band: Michael Doucet
performs with Marc and Ann Savoy on several albums and in concerts around the nation. The
bottom picture is from the 1999 performance at Downtown Alive. |
Michael Doucet and BeauSoleil
have deservedly gained international renown for their inspired interpretation of
traditional Cajun music and their innovation in "Cajunizing" other musical
styles--jazz, Caribbean, or even Tex-Mex. Doucet began playing in a folk rock band with
his cousin, Zachary Richard, when they were about 12. Growing up in Scott near Lafayette
at a time when the Cajun renaissance was just beginning, Doucet did not fully appreciate
the rich musical heritage of his native region until he visited France, where he
discovered that French bands were performing traditional Cajun music. On his return
to Louisiana, he sought out musicians like Dewey Balfa, Canray Fontenot, and Dennis McGee.
Doucet originally planned to attend graduate school in New Mexico to study English
Romantic poetry, but, as he told Barry Ancelet in Cajun and Creole Music Makers,
"J'ai barguiné Blake pour Balfa et je suis rentré plutôt chez nous."
[However, Doucet has recorded music to accompany Blake's Songs of Innocence and
Experience on Red House Records.] Through his close friendship with McGee, who died
in 1989 at age 96, Doucet learned about traditional Cajun music extending back before the
introduction of the accordion and including music produced through the collaboration
between McGee and Amédé Ardoin. Doucet was a member
of Coteau, a mid-seventies band that combined Cajun and rock styles, but at the same time
he was performing with friends who came together to form BeauSoleil. The band's name
BeauSoleil comes from a nickname for Joseph Broussard, one of the heroes in the Acadian
resistance against the English in Acadie who later joined the Acadians in Louisiana. The
nickname is said to describe Broussard's smile, which was bright as the sun.
BeauSoleil's debut album, "The Spirit of Cajun
Music," was released in 1977. The band has recorded regularly ever since.
"L'Amour ou Folie" won the Grammy award as the best traditional folk album for
1998. BeauSoleil has received seven other Grammy nominations, including a
contemporary folk nomination for their 1999 CD, "Cajunization," in which they
continue to explore varied musical styles while also offering interpretations of
traditional Cajun songs. Their 2001 CD, "Looking Back Tomorrow," released
during the 25th anniversary of the group, was recorded live at Wolf Trap in Vienna, Va.,
where BeauSoleil performed for first time at a major national venue. The CD, which has
received a 2001 Grammy nomination in the Best Traditional Folk category, reprises some
favorites like "Travaillier c'est trop dur," "J'ai été au bal,"
"Grand Mamou," "Pa Janvier" and "Parlez-nous à boire," but
also introduces new songs, including one song in which Amédé Ardoin sums up his
music and his life and another song in which Doucet describes his own recollections of
fiddler Varise Connor. The other 2001 CD is Best of the
Crawfish Years, 1985-1991, with 17 classic BeauSoleil cuts from Rounder Records.
BeauSoleil has more than 20 recordings, among them
"L'Echo" (1994), "La Danse de la Vie" (1993), "Bayou Deluxe"
(1993: a "best of" album), "Cajun Conja" (1991), "Deja Vu"
(1990), and "Live! From the Left Coast" (1989). Doucet has a number of other
recordings, including several with the Savoy-Doucet Band.
In one interview, Doucet gave explanation of the evolution
of Cajun music as played by BeauSoleil: "Cajun music is wrapped up in emotion. Maybe
some of the emotions, the more modern emotions, aren't adequately covered by the old
songs. So that's what we try to do through our new compositions. In many ways we're the
same individuals our ancestors were 300 years ago, but the times around us have changed.
If the music captures where we are now, it just adds to the preservation of Cajun
music."
Click
here for more pictures of Michael Doucet and BeauSoleil.
Click
here for 2002 photos.
Click here
for more information from Doucet's booking agent.
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