This region (formerly known as the Dutch West Indies) consists of six islands in the Caribbean Sea: Aruba; Bonaire and Curaçao (known as the Netherlands Leeward Islands); and Saba, St Eustatius and the southern half of St Maarten (the Netherlands Windward Islands). Aruba and those in the Leeward group are situated off the coast of Venezuela, while those in the Windward group are located to the south-east of Puerto Rico, forming part of the chain of islands known as the Lesser Antilles. The total area of the Netherlands Antilles and Aruba is 993 sq. km. The largest island, Curaçao, is 444 sq. km; the smallest, Saba, is 13 sq. km. The combined population is approximately 298,000 which breaks down as follows: Curaçao, 151,000; Aruba, 91,000; St Maarten (Dutch half), 39,000; Bonaire, 14,000; St Eustatius, 1,900; and Saba, 1,000.
Differing histories have left the six islands with diverse populations and varied cultural configurations. All of the islands were originally visited or inhabited by Arawak or Carib Indians. The southern islands of Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao, after an initial period of Spanish rule, came under Dutch control in 1634; to the north, St Maarten, St Eustatius and Saba were seized by the Dutch during the same decade. Some islands in both the Leeward and Windward groups were captured by Britain or France a number of times before finally being returned to the Netherlands (the northern half of St Maarten, known as St Martin, remains an Overseas Department of France). The extent to which plantation economies and slavery came to dominate varied greatly from one island to the next. Such historical variations help to explain present-day ethnic, religious and linguistic differences. For instance, on Curaçao a majority of people are of African descent, whereas on Aruba a much larger proportion are of Amerindian descent, and on Saba nearly half are primarily of European descent. Curaçao was until recently primarily Roman Catholic, with a small but historically important Jewish minority; in contrast, St Eustatius and St Maarten have long been largely Protestant. While the inhabitants of the Leeward islands speak Papiamentu (a unique creole language with a vocabulary derived primarily from Portuguese, Spanish and Dutch), as well as Dutch (the official language), those of the Windward islands for the most part speak English as their native language.
These six islands remained a colony of the Netherlands until 1954, when they became an integral part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, known collectively as the Netherlands Antilles. In 1986 Aruba seceded from the Netherlands Antilles and became an autonomous partner in the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
KENNETH BILBY
Netherlands Antilles and Aruba
Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao possess musical cultures that overlap to a considerable extent, although each island displays distinctive musical characteristics. All three share a neo-African, drum-centred tradition known as tambu (in Bonaire often referred to as bari), a quintessential Netherlands Antilles folk music, particularly on Curaçao, where it has come to serve as an important symbol of Curaçaoan identity and of the African past. In older versions of this tradition, a single drum made from a hollowed log (tambu) or wooden barrel (bari) is accompanied by a percussion instrument known as chapi or agan (also known as gan or heroe), a piece of metal (such as a section of an old plough or the head of a hoe) beaten with an iron rod. Sometimes a scraper or rasp (wiri) made from a gourd, cow-horn or serrated metal tube is also included; in the related bari tradition of Bonaire, various other instruments, such as guitar and cuatro (four-string guitar), are often added to the drum and percussion ensemble. While a lead singer alternates with a repeating chorus, the tambu and wiri keep up a complex rhythmic interplay. Lyrics are often improvised, and tend to centre on social commentary. Although for many years the African-based tambu tradition was suppressed by the Dutch colonial government, it survived by going underground and now enjoys renewed popularity.
Various other genres feature combinations of instruments that are unique to the Netherlands Antilles. The muziek di zumbi (‘spirit music’) of Curaçao, which dates back at least to the 19th century, brought together the benta (mouth bow), tambu grandi (large version of the tambu drum), triano (triangle), chapi (metallic percussion instrument) and wiri (scraper). The benta (also known as janchicobaden), which has both African and Amerindian antecedents, is made from a branch of the karawara tree, bent and held under tension by a coconut fibre attached to both ends. The player places his mouth at one end and strikes the string with a small stick or spoon handle, simultaneously stopping the string with the back of a knife; by modifying the shape of the oral cavity he is able to further vary the tones. By the early 20th century, the benta was often replaced by a flute.
The simadan or seu (harvest festival) of Curaçao is the setting in which the cachu (or cachu di supla), an African-derived instrument made from the horn of a cow, is played. The player blows through a hole bored in the side, a few centimetres from the tip; the tip itself is cut off, creating an opening that is alternately covered and opened with the thumb to change pitch. Cachu is played both individually and in ensembles, sometimes along with percussion and call-and-response singing. The simadan festivals of Bonaire also feature an African-derived aerophone, the becu, made from a stalk of the sorghum plant. The player blows through a reed cut out of the body, both exhaling and inhaling, while changing pitch by alternately closing the two fingerholes. Yet another aerophone is the carco (on Bonaire, sometimes called kinkon), a large conch shell that is blown at harvest festivals. The carco is also used to announce certain holidays and to send signals by imitating speech patterns. Bonaire also has a smaller version known as cocolishi or kiwa.
An abundance of other distinctive instruments can be found on Aruba and the Leeward islands in various contexts. One of the most interesting is the bastel (bestel), a type of water drum consisting of a large calabash bowl turned upside down in a tub of water. When struck with two sticks, the instrument is called seu; when played with both hands, it is called bastel. Virtually identical water drums exist in several parts of Africa. Instruments of Curaçao include the matrimonial or wacharaca (a percussion instrument made from a thin wooden board to which several small, cymbal-like metal discs are nailed), the cuchara (a pair of spoons played as a percussion instrument) and the kai (a hand-cranked mechanical piano imported from Venezuela, also known as kaha di musika, doshi di alegria or tingilingibox). The fio, a type of folk fiddle, is found in Aruba, while the bamba, a stamping tube made of bamboo, is exclusive to Bonaire and is played in pairs of varying length.
A variety of distinctive song traditions exist in Aruba and the Leeward islands. Song genres associated with harvest festivals include seu, simadan and wapa, the latter performed as part of a line dance. Work songs are also found on all the islands. These include digging songs, house-building songs, rowing songs, road-building songs, harvest songs, unloading songs and axe songs. Unique to Aruba is a song genre known as dande, a kind of serenading tradition practised during New Year, when groups of singers and backing musicians (on fiddle, guitar and other instruments) go from house to house to perform. Another interesting vocal practice is tambu di boca (‘mouth drumming’), in which performers vocally simulate the interlocking rhythmic parts that normally make up a tambu ensemble (tambu, wiri and/or chapi).
During the 19th century Aruba and the Leeward islands were strongly influenced by the music of both neighbouring Venezuela and Colombia (especially the song and dance forms joropo and pasillo) and the Spanish Caribbean (danza and merengue), and soon instruments such as guitar, mandolin and cuarta (a local version of the Venezuelan cuatro) were regularly featured in local dance ensembles. Because of the popularity of Cuban dance music, the marimbula (bass lamellophone) was also introduced. Also important during the 19th century were the various salon or ballroom dances imported from Europe and the United States (such as quadrille, mazurka, schottische, polka, lancers dance and Virginia reel). Both ‘purer’ and more creolized versions of these have long formed part of the repertories of dance bands on the Leeward islands. As in many other parts of the Caribbean, these salon dances, originally associated with the higher social strata, began to absorb elements from various local folk genres; at the same time, they also influenced the latter.
These cross-influences led to various new mixed genres. One of the most popular of these, known as tumba, grew partly out of the older tambu tradition, to which new instruments such as strings and horns were added, along with musical elements from a number of other Latin American and Caribbean dance styles. By the 1950s, tumba was being played by larger orchestras and was also being employed as a compositional form by local composers, some of whom were trained in European art music. Under the influence of other Caribbean musics, it had also branched out into a variety of sub-styles including tumba guaracha, tumba pregona, tumba cumbia, tumba calypso and tumba di carnaval. Since the 1950s, tumba has been the local popular music par excellence of Curaçao, Aruba and Bonaire. Some of the creolized European dance music genres that evolved in the islands during the 19th century also retain a strong association with local identity, similarly straddling the vernacular musical traditions of rural areas and the salon music of urban elites. The most important of these is the Antillean waltz (also known as the Curaçaoan waltz), distinguished from its European relatives chiefly by its differently accented rhythmic patterns.
European church and art music also have a long history in the Netherlands Antilles, particularly on Curaçao, where schooled composers have produced a number of works that draw inspiration from both the European art music tradition and the local folk heritage.
Netherlands Antilles and Aruba
Virtually no ethnomusicological research has been carried out on the islands of St Eustatius and Saba. Little is known of older forms of music that might have once been peculiar to St Eustatius; present-day music making on this island is limited almost entirely to popular genres imported from elsewhere in the region, such as steel band music and the soca and zouk styles of the eastern Caribbean. Saba, on the other hand, has more clearly retained certain elements of an older local musical culture. Dance music has traditionally played an important role in neighbourhood festivities, picnics and other social gatherings on Saba; until fairly recently, dances were held regularly by invitation in private homes (‘home parties’), with the location rotating from week to week. Older orchestras generally featured an accordion (locally called ‘music box’), one or more drums and a triangle. Drums were usually made from kegs or barrels, over which a single sheepskin or goatskin head was secured and tightened by means of wooden hoops, rope and pegs. Sometimes these were supplemented with an assortment of other percussion instruments, such as maracas, wera or wero (metal scrapers similar to the wiri of the Leeward islands), tambourines, and hoe handles struck with a stick. This older dance music was also sometimes enhanced by additional percussive techniques, such as tapping on tables and chairs, and rapping of knuckles against house partitions. More recently, fiddle, harmonica or guitar could sometimes be heard alongside the accordion. One of the most popular of the older dances was the local version of the quadrille (typically consisting of either eight or 16 sets). Other dances that came into favour over time included merengue, waltzes, ‘rhumba’ (based on the Cuban son) and bolero. The accordion and percussion ensembles that played these genres were gradually supplanted by newer string bands modelled on those found on St Maarten and other islands in the Lesser Antilles. Despite changes in instrumentation, however, some of the older styles continue to be played.
St Maarten also retains a distinctive musical culture (shared to some extent with the French side of the island), though little formal research has been conducted there. Rapid development and the growth of the tourist industry during the second half of the 20th century has helped make St Maarten a major commercial centre and a crossroads for popular musicians from across the Caribbean, many of whom arrive looking for work in hotels and clubs. As a result, the island has become the site of a diverse and unusually cosmopolitan musical scene, influenced by a variety of imported popular genres; at the same time, this recent influx of foreign popular musics has served to eclipse the original folk music of the island, and most of the older styles are rarely performed today.
The indigenous music and dance genre considered most typical of St Maarten is the ponum dance (sometimes spelt ponnum or pannum), which has been characterized by some as the ‘national dance’. Thought to have originated among the island's slave population during the early 19th century, this dance is said to have been performed to celebrate emancipation in 1848. The ponum dance remained the principal social dance music in rural areas into the early 20th century, when it began to be replaced by string band music. The central instrument was the pump drum, a membranophone with a goatskin head. Pump drums varied in length from 20 cm to 1 m or more and were played with both hands. Two or more pump drums could be played simultaneously, and sometimes the drums were accompanied by other instruments such as a locally made tambourine, various metallic percussion instruments, and, more recently, fiddle, fife and triangle. By the late 19th century, such ensembles included in their repertories a number of European-derived dance musics, such as quadrille, polka, Scottish reel and maypole music, as well as highly creolized local versions of these known under other names such as the ‘wash dance’ or the ‘saltpicking dance’. Ponum dances were also the occasion for the performance of a genre of songs known as brim songs.
A related musical genre is the song form known as quimbe. These songs were apparently once associated with ponum dances and were sometimes accompanied by drumming, but are now usually performed unaccompanied. They belong to a larger Caribbean tradition of topical songs and sung social criticism that includes genres such as calypso. Quimbe songs may be composed on the spot and often deal with local gossip and current affairs. In the past, they were sometimes performed in the context of ‘contests’ in which singers would try to outdo one another with impromptu compositions. Clever and rapid rhyming was an important part of the tradition.
Work songs, performed in call-and-response style, also once formed a part of daily life. These included planting songs, house-building songs, house-moving songs and arrowroot-pounding songs, most often performed as part of the local cooperative labour tradition known as ‘jollification’.
Inter-island migration began to have a major impact on the music of St Maarten during the first few decades of the 20th century. Many St Maarten residents migrated as labourers to the Dominican Republic, where some settled in the British West Indies enclave at San Pedro de Macorís. A number of these returned to St Maarten in the late 1920s and introduced new instruments such as guitar, accordion, marimba (bass lamellophone, of Cuban origin) and tambora (double-headed drum of Dominican origin), as well as a new style based on Dominican and Cuban genres such as merengue, bolero and guaracha. Other migrants returned from periods of staying on Curaçao, Aruba, Anguilla, St Kitts and various other islands, and, along with visiting musicians from these islands, injected other new elements and instruments into the mix, such as mandolin, concertina, flute, tres (a guitar with three sets of doubled strings, known as trey in St Maarten), bahoe (a bass aerophone made of bamboo or metal pipe) and wiri (a serrated metal or gourd rasp also played on Curaçao, Aruba and other islands, known as wiro on St Maarten). This cosmopolitan mix of instruments and styles fused with elements from the indigenous ponum and quimbe traditions, forming the basis of St Maarten's unique string band tradition. At a variety of festive events known as ‘casa dances’, ‘house concerts’, ‘bullfight dances’ and ‘two-sou dances’, these new string bands forged a pan-Caribbean sound, playing local versions of genres such as merengue, mazurka, bolero, calypso, polka, waltzes and tumba. This local string band tradition remains fairly vigorous on both the Dutch and French sides of the island.
Netherlands Antilles and Aruba
GEWM, ii (D. Sheehy)
N. van Meeteren: Volkskunde van Curaçao (Scherpenheuvel, 1947)
L. Lekis: Dances of Curaçao (New York, 1954)
R. Boskaljon: Honderd jaar muziekleven op Curaçao (Assen, 1958)
L. Lekis: Folk Dances of Latin America (New York, 1958)
L. Lekis: Dancing Gods (New York, 1960)
P. Brenneker: ‘Muziek’, Sambumbu, iii (Curaçao, 1970), 511–21
E. Palm: Muziek en musici van de Nederlandse Antillen (Curaçao, 1978)
J. Crane, ed.: Saba Silhouettes (New York, 1987)
J. Gansemans: ‘Le marimbula, un lamellophone africain aux Antilles néerlandaises’, Cahiers de musiques traditionelles, ii (Geneva, 1989), 125–32
L.M. Sekou, ed.: Fête: Celebrating St. Martin's Traditional Festive Music (Philipsburg, 1992)
M.P. Sypkens Smit: Beyond the Tourist Trap: a Study of Sint Maarten Culture (Amsterdam, 1995)
R. Rosalia: Tambú: de legale en kerkelijke repressie van Afro-Curaçaose volksuitingen (Zutphen, 1997)
Caribbean Dances, Folkways FW 6840 (1953) [includes selections from Curaçao]
Dances of Curaçao, Monogram 131/Alcoa 445 (1954)
Zojojo i su grupo: trata imagina, Isidora n.n. (1981) [tambu music from Curaçao]
Aruba-Bonaire-Curaçao: Volksmuziek-musique populaire, Etnomusicologisch Centrum Paul Collaer ECPC 01 (1982) [incl. notes by J. Gansemans]; reissued as Tumba, Cuarta and Kai, Original Music OMC201 (n.d.)
Issoco's Greatest Hits, Grupo Issoco (1991) [muziek di zumbi from Curaçao]
Fête, House of Nehesi (1992) [string band music from St Maarten]
ABC of the Antilles, Philips PHI 444 (n.d.)