|
|
 |
Faith healer: Erol Josue uses music to rehabilitate voodoo’s image
|
| Click Here to go back. |
Boston Herald, Faith healer: Erol Josue uses music to rehabilitate voodoo’s image >>
-by Robert C Young
Erol Josue is a Haitian vodou (voodoo) priest inspired by a higher power - yet he makes some of the earthiest Caribbean roots music you’ve ever heard.
The singer, who visits Johnny D’s tomorrow to mark the release of his new CD, “Regleman,” doesn’t want listeners to merely move to his “electro vodou.” Josue wants them to understand that his religion isn’t about black magic, zombies and dolls with pins stuck in them.
“It’s about community, and about love, independence and revolution,” said the 34-year-old New York-based artist known as “The Prince of Haitian Roots Music.” “My biggest problem is when television and Hollywood present the stereotype of vodou - people drinking blood, people as cannibals. When people see that they think that is vodou, which is not true.
“We believe in God - Granmet in Creole - who is the architect of the universe. With my music I want to cross over to present the real faith of Haiti, of vodou.”
Josue was born in Port-au-Prince, grew up in his family’s vodou temple and became a priest - a houngan - when he was 17. He’s been leading ceremonies ever since, first in Paris for 13 years where he concentrated on a career as choreographer, and since 2003 in Brooklyn, where music has been his alternate muse.
“Regleman” takes the Haitian sound into the new century by replacing traditional instruments, such as the flute and tambou drum, with violin and electronic effects that owe more than a little to modern trance music.
“The album is not traditional vodou music,” said Josue, “but you can still feel its authenticity. There’s a fission in it, about me as a priest, and about exile.”
With lyrics in Creole, the CD’s 13 songs honor the 13 most important voudou loas (spirits), and range in subject from a song about pouring water on earth to a conversation between the gods of wisdom and ceremony.
“Vodou is the spirit of our ancestors,” Josue said. “It’s very important for me to connect with my roots.”
Josue is no stranger to Boston - he was a visiting scholar in Latin American studies at Harvard and a regular at Boston Medical Center, where he shared Haitian herbal healing techniques with medical students.
What he tells anyone who’ll listen about vodou: “Be more curious.”
Which led to an invitation from the singer to anyone who wants to experience a vodou ceremony in either Boston or New York: E-mail Josue aterolfanclub@gmail.com and he’ll see if he can arrange it.
Better yet, catch him onstage to get a musical taste of what it’s all about.
Erol Josue, Johnny D’s, Somerville, Friday at 9:45 p.m.; 617-776-2004 or www.johnnyds.com. 05/24/07 >> go there
|
| Click Here to go back. |
|
 |
|
|
|
