more from
Time Capsule
We’ve updated our Terms of Use to reflect our new entity name and address. You can review the changes here.
We’ve updated our Terms of Use. You can review the changes here.

Ven En Levé

by Gratien Midonet

/
  • Streaming + Download

    Includes unlimited streaming via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.
    Purchasable with gift card

      £5 GBP  or more

     

1.
Ven En Levé 05:43
2.
3.
Manman 03:40
4.
5.
Ti Bolom 03:57
6.
7.
Lan Me Gro 02:47
8.
Georgina 03:57
9.
10.

about

Mixing up genres, singing in Créole and fusing bélè and gwoka rhythms, while adding a decidedly more European feel, Gratien Midonet's first album from 1979.

You can hear this fusion of styles on the mystical ‘Mari Rhont Ouve La Pot’, a song for which he credits his collaborator, pianist and arranger Eric Randon for the visionary ideas that perfectly matched Midonet’s sketches of the track. Gratien was all ears and all too happy to bounce off Randon’s suggestions, which led to this unique symbiosis between an acoustic folk sensibility, organic rhythms, cosmic synths, and spiritual, soulful lyrics which you can hear throughout the album. Interestingly he was unaware of other artists and bands (Roland Brival, Marius Cultier, Edmony Krater, etc) also working on a similar path of fusing traditional Caribbean rhythms with western styles like jazz, funk and soul.

Midonet had written the song ‘Ven En Lévé’ (‘A Rising Wind') two years before resigning from his day job, and it became an instant hit upon its release in 1979. It was massive in Martinique and amongst the French Caribbean diaspora, and an anthem for the then popular independence movement. It was used as such during the trial of one of their activists at the time and subsequently banned for two years from the French airwaves, which consequently made the song even more popular, as it would be covered in 1981 by Les Vikings de la Guadeloupe (later to become Kassav) and still is to this day by the likes of Akiyo (a popular pro-independence carnival drum band from Guadeloupe). ‘Ven En Levé’ and some of his texts are still being studied in schools in Martinique and Guadeloupe today.

Fully remastered digital only release. A selection of the above tracks are included on the double vinyl compilation of Gratien Midonet's work, A Cosmic Poet from Martinique 1979 - 1989.

credits

released November 13, 2020

license

all rights reserved

tags

about

Gratien Midonet Martinique

“I always broke free from the rules, from codes being too narrow,” says poet, musician and sonic shaman Gratien Midonet. “I have always had this sense of peaceful knowledge that there is no separation between genres, beings and universal things.”

Not plain folk, not bélè, chouval bwa, beguine or gwoka but a transcendental fusion of all these and a true reflection of his personality.
... more

contact / help

Contact Gratien Midonet

Streaming and
Download help

Redeem code

Report this album or account

If you like Gratien Midonet, you may also like: