Diana Golden: Tanbou Kache

Haiti, impoverished by unrelenting disasters – hurricanes, earthquakes and depredating exploitation from within and abroad – has nevertheless maintained an extraordinarily rich artistic heritage; vibrant, joyous, unconquerable. I’ve been there and experienced it first-hand. So has New York-based cellist Diana Golden, teaching in the art-city of Jacmel. She’s also conducted research at Montreal’s Société de recherche et de diffusion de la musique haïtienne.

Golden explains that the CD’s title, meaning “hidden drums,” refers to the Vodou drums accompanying traditional folk songs. The eight pieces, each lasting between five and 13 minutes, vary stylistically from the neo-Baroque Petite Suite for solo cello by Werner Jaegerhuber (1900-1953) to the minimalist meditations of Femiel, part of an 80-minute work for electronic instruments by Daniel Bernard Roumain (b.1970).

I particularly enjoyed the distinctively Haitian compositions. The bittersweet Légende créole by Justin Élie (1883-1931) incorporates a children’s song about hide-and-seek. Affecting, soulful, folkloric melodies fill the Suite haïtienne by Frantz Casséus (1915-1993), originally for guitar, here arranged by Julio Racine (b.1945). In Racine’s own Sonate à Cynthia (2014), two rhythmic Allegros bracket the pentatonic motifs of the lyrical Cantilena. Carmen Brouard (1909-2005) spent her last 29 years in Montreal where she helped found the Société mentioned above. Her Duo Sentimental pits Haitian pentatonics against a twelve-tone row, ending in a harmonious “Amoroso."

Golden’s closely-miked, dark-hued tone and expressive phrasing, aided by Taiwanese-Canadian pianist Shawn Chang, make a strong case for the unfairly neglected music of this unfairly neglected country.

— Michael Schulman, 12.04.2020

In presenting a collection of classical works by twentieth and twenty-first century Haitian composers, cellist Diana Golden and pianist Shawn Chang provide a public service to both the artists involved and listeners who heretofore might have had little exposure to the composers in question. In being exposed to material representative of Haiti's art music traditions, said listener not only gains insight into the country's musical culture but also spends a thoroughly rewarding sixty-six minutes in the company of Golden and Chang. Of course they too benefit from the project in showing themselves to be interpreters of the first rank.

Golden is eminently qualified to take on the project. Though she's NYC-based, her doctoral research at Rutgers University focused on Haitian art music. In 2011, she began working at a Boston music centre with cello students who had left the country after the 2010 earthquake and a year later taught at the École de Musique Dessaix-Baptiste in Jacmel, Haiti. Through such endeavours she discovered that many Haitian composers' works have been neither performed nor recorded and so she and Chang decided to create the album to bring recognition to the artists and introduce the public to their compositions. Tanbou Kache (Hidden Drum) was chosen, by the way, as the title because it references the Vodou drum part that appears in traditional Haitian folk songs and that was transcribed by ethnographer Werner Jaegerhuber, whose efforts inspired generations of Haitian composers.

Space limitations allow for only a modest amount of detail to appear here about the recording; included with the release, however, are liner notes by Dr. Claude Dauphin, a Haitian music scholar, that provide extensive background. As mentioned, composers from both centuries are represented, with material by the influential early figure Justin Élie (1883-1931) followed by the next generation's Jaegerhuber (1900-1953), Frantz Casséus (1915-1993), and Carmen Brouard (1909-2005); completing the portrait are pieces by Julio Racine (b. 1945), Daniel Bernard Roumain (b. 1970), and Jean “Rudy” Perrault (b. 1961). A mix of standalone pieces and multi-movement works makes for a satisfying programme.

Originally composed for violin and piano and based on the folkloric children's song “Zonbi bann mannan,” Élie's five-minute appetizer Légende créole engages with affectingly melancholic melodies and a playful game of hide-and-seek between the instruments at its centre. Jaegerhuber's four-movement Petite Suite for solo cello follows, its baroque stylings strongly suggesting a J.S. Bach influence. As with other pieces on the recording, Petite Suite reminds us that Haitian composers don't create in a vacuum but are influenced by artists in the Western classical tradition too. After a scene-setting opening movement (not given a title but nonetheless acting as a prelude), the three others are concise contrapuntal meditations that capture Golden traversing the cello's upper and lower registers and ostensibly conducting an engrossing dialogue with herself.

Written in 1953 for solo guitar and performed here in an arrangement by Racine, Casséus's four-part Suite haïtienne comes next, with Golden giving expressive voice to a plethora of folkloric melodies and its energetic third part incorporating the cinquillo rhythm (five syncopated beats in a duple meter) associated with the Haitian méringue. Racine appears again, this time with his own Sonate à Cynthia (2014), a three-part work dedicated to his daughter and structured with two frenetic allegros framing a plaintive cantilena. Born in Port-au-Prince and a Montreal resident since 1977, Brouard is represented by Duo Sentimental, a tempestuous single-movement setting that sees twelve-tone rows and Haitian pentatonic scales reconciled, the gesture symbolic of the composer's own embrace of multiple stylistic traditions and cultural influences.

Rounding out the release are Femiel by Roumain and two by Perrault. The former, which derives from the eighty-minute multimedia work One Loss Plus, features Golden combining pizzicato and bowing in a five-minute piece whose sombre quality's intensified by sparse piano accompaniment and an insistent cello soliloquy. Perrault used the conceit of an imaginary talk between Martin Luther King and Malcolm X about Obama's ascendancy as a springboard for Brother Malcolm… How precisely the musical design corresponds to that idea might be open to interpretation, but there's no discounting the forcefulness of its expression. Against dreamy piano cascades, Golden unleashes an impassioned outpouring, the instruments' pairing perhaps suggesting the animated to-and-fro between the speakers as they discuss the ex-president's tenure.

Listeners previously unexposed to Haitian classical works will find no difficulty warming to the material when melody and emotional expression are abundant and when the performers amplify those aspects so powerfully. Chang's playing is sterling throughout, Golden's ravishing. Collectively Tanbou Kache provides an illuminating overview of the country's classical music repertoire, and one imagines a second volume could easily be produced were Golden and Chang disposed to keep the project going.

— Ron Schepper, 10.30.2020

The most remarkable piece on Diana Golden's recital of original music, transcriptions, and arrangements by 20th- and 21st-century Haitian composers is Werner Jaegerhuber’s Petite Suite in C minor for solo cello. It starts out as the reminiscence of a Bach Suite from a 20th-century perspective. The opening “Prelude” explores the same limited registers as the early Suites and just when you are convinced this retro Bach won't work, you realize how engrossing the cellist's sound is, and you realize it's not really Bach after all. The “Menuetto” is the same but maybe as if it had been inverted, suggesting the presence of other, eerie voices. After an Allegro grows increasingly complex in its handling of Bachian technical quirks while sounding new lyrical notes in unexpected high reaches, the concluding “Tema contrapunctistica” plods along wonderully like E-flat major yearning to be D major. Played with eloquent command by Golden, it's 15 minutes of pure delight, even if Bach didn't write it.

The other most remarkable pieces are Daniel Bernard Roumain's transcendental five-minute excerpt from his 80-minute One Loss Plus meditation and Jean Rudy Perrault's imaginary conversation between Martin Luther King and Malcolm X on Barack Obama's inauguration to the presidency, which has a calm, inspirational tone that couldn't have come at a better time.

The many other lovely things here include Justin Elie's Legendecreole, which moves effortlessly high on the A string, languorous like Faure'sElegie, and the four movements of Frantz Casseus' little Suite hai'tienne, high- lighted by a wonderfully incongruous jazz riff, a sweet melancholy pastoral lyric, and a charming characteristic dance.

— LV, 11.06.2020

Tanbou Kache means "hidden drum" in Haitian Creole. The term was originally applied to the music of composer Werner Jaegerhuber but is relevant to several of the composers included on this recital album by cellist Diana Golden and pianist Shawn Chang. Although the music is largely in conventional European forms, there's an interesting layer of hidden African rhythm, especially in the piano part, that appears subtly and intermittently. This is not the deep fusion of Villa-Lobos, or even of Louis Moreau Gottschalk, but it's intriguing on its terms. The project has the feel of a personal enthusiasm of Golden, with several pieces having to be transcribed for the cello. Jaegerhuber's Petite Suite pour violoncelle is an authentic cello work, but it doesn't really fit the theme: it is a purely Bachian counterpoint exercise. Listen to the Suite haïtienne of Frantz Casséus for a stronger taste: the work was originally written for guitar and was recorded by the composer on the Folkways label in the 1950s. There are also works by members of the Haitian diaspora and by composers born in the U.S., reflecting a wide range of influences but still distinctive. Thus, the program covers several generations of music-making and gives a flavor of a tradition that will be unknown to most listeners.

— James Manheim, 12.01.2020

One of the very few positive developments to come out of the era of western imperialism was the spread of classical music around the globe. One of the most fascinating and lyrical albums of chamber music from over the past several months is cellist Diana Golden and pianist Shawn Chang’s collection of works by Haitian composers, Tanbou Kache, streaming at Bandcamp.

The title means “hidden drum” in kreyol. Just as the clave is ubiquitous in latin music, the vodou drum rhythm – a similarly African import – persists in much of Haitian music, whether outright or implied. As is the case with many global traditions where the culture has been repressed by tyrannical regimes, Haitian popular song is ripe with signification and subtle political subtext. How much of that translates to the compositions here?

As you might imagine from the instrumentation, much of this is on the somber side. The duo open with early 20th century composer Justin Élie’s Légende Créole, a somber neo-romantic piece originally for violin and piano with a fleetingly blithe interlude midway through. Golden takes her time expressively with the chromatics and minor-key solemnity of Werner Jaegerhuber’s Petite Suite for Solo Cello. While it’s another early 20th century work, it draws a straight line back to Bach, in terms of melody if not thematic development.

Contemporary composer Julio Racine’s arrangement of 20th century classical guitarist Frantz Casséus’ Suite Haïtienne makes a return to sober, spacious minor-key neo-romanticism with dark folk tinges in the opening movement. Golden and Chang wistfully parse the second movement before Chang picks up with a merengue-inspired bounce in the third and in the vigorous conclusion, originally a hit for Harry Belafonte with the composer on guitar.

Carmen Brouard, one of the prime movers in 20th century Haitian composition, died at 96 in 2005. Sadly, it wasn’t until she moved to Montreal that she began to earn recognition beyond the land of her birth. Her Duo Sentimental, a song without words, alternates between a distantly acerbic, dancing anthemic sensibiilty and Brahmsian familiarity.

Julio Racine is represented by his Sonate à Cynthia, written in 2014 and the most recent piece here. The simmering, Piazzolla-esque passion of the opening movement gives Chang a welcome moment to come to the forefront, while Golden’s plaintive phrasing takes over at the end. The second has a broodingly chromatic, anthemic sway; Golden’s trills fuel the coda at the end. It’s arguably the album’s most memorable work.

The duo follow with a moody, minimalist, bluesy Daniel Bernard Roumain miniature and conclude the record with two works by another contemporary composer, Jean “Rudy” Perrault. Still Around, for solo cello has more distant Bach echoes than the first solo cello piece here.

Brother Malcolm… for cello and piano imagines Martin Luther King and Malcolm X discussing Barack Obama’s inauguration via a sternly crescendoing, Romantic trajectory, and what seems like very guarded triumph.

Beyond the sheer emotional impact of the music, this album has enormous historical value. If the rest of the Haitian classical repertoire is anything like this, it should be vastly better known.

— delarue, 12.23.2020

This is cello music based on Haitian sources, working its way through the 20th Century and out at this end. It begins with Justin Elie’s (1883-1931) ‘Legende Creole’, originally a violin piece, here transcribed for cello and piano, five minutes of joy and thoughtfulness blended together. Werner Jaegerhuber (1900-53) wrote a cello suite in four movements based on Bach and recalling him with relish while pianist Chang gets to go to lunch. Frantz Casseus (1915-93) checks in with Suite Haiti enne, four movements originally written for guitar. Now we meet Carmen Brouard (1909- 2005) wrote ‘Duo sentimental’, an effective 5- minute piece composed for a Canadian student of hers. Julio Racine gives us a threemovement Sonate a Cynthia dedicated to his musician daughter and written only a year before he died. It is a modernistic but effective work. Our youngest member is Daniel Bernard Roumain, who was born in 1970 in the US and whose 5-minute ‘Feniel’ is a transcription from an 80-minute work originally written for electric violin and electric keyboard—minimalist and rather repetitive. Jean “Rudy” Perrault (b. 1961) is a professor at the University of Minnesota Duluth and gives us a 5-minute theme & variations called ‘Still around’ for solo cello, and a 7-minute cello & piano depiction of ‘Brother Malcolm’, a piece paraphrasing an imaginary “conversation between Martin Luther King and Malcolm X” about Barack Obama’s inauguration to the presidency. These make a fine ending to an unusual and enjoyable program. Cellist Golden tells us that she became interested in Haitian music while working at the Open Access to Music Education for Children, a music center for Boston’s Haitian community, where she met a number of cello students who had left Haiti after the 2010 earthquake. She went into research and eventually developed this program, which she plays with feeling and accuracy, as does her pianist partner. The title translates as “hidden drum” and refers to Werner Jaegerhuber, who inspired generations of Haitian composers.

— David W. Moore, 3.03.2021

Diana Golden (cello) and Shawn Chang (piano) play 16 pieces (1 hr, 06 min, 20 sec) by 20th and 21st century Haitians. For those thinking that Haitian composers work is likely to sound wildly different to more well known western composers... you're about to be taught an interesting lesson.

These pieces could just as easily have been penned by European or American composers. All of the pieces appear timeless - they could have been written this morning or a hundred years ago. But, they all have one thing in common. They all speak from the heart, dredging up raw emotions and really getting under your skin.

While this is obviously down to each individual composer's skill as an artist, a lot of the credit on these recordings has to go to Golden and Chang who really pour their heart, soul... and every conceivable emotion into their performances. It feels like the duo know these pieces inside out; have been playing them for many year. And yet their performances here feel fresh and inviting, as though these were pieces that they both come alive when playing.

This is a rich and rewarding collection of beautiful classical pieces.

— Darren Rea, 5.23.2021

This is an attractive disc of music by Haitian composers, all of which is likely to be new to most listeners. Diana Golden is an American cellist who holds a Doctorate of Musical Arts in cello performance from Rutgers University, completing her doctoral research on Haitian art music. Her interest in the subject began when Golden worked for a program run by Youth and Family Enrichment Services for Boston’s Haitian community. Many of her cello students had left Haiti after the 2010 earthquake. As they learned to play Haitian folksongs for community performances, she was motivated to begin her research, which became a personal passion. This disc is a product of that passion.

The title of the collection, Tanbou Kache, means “hidden drum” In Haitian Creole. It describes Werner Jaegerhuber’s treatment of the cello in his chamber music. Jaegerhuber (1900–1953) was an important early Haitian composer who was frequently inspired by indigenous Vodou. His solo piece Petite Suite seems, however, to be more inspired by Bach. He finds imaginative ways to create counterpoint and even dialogue while writing for unaccompanied cello.

The other piece for solo cello is Still Around by Jean “Rudy” Perrault (b. 1961). Haitian-born, Perrault is currently professor of music at the University of Minnesota, Duluth. Still Around is an energetic and imaginative work in the form of a theme and variations. Adding a piano, Perrault’s Brother Malcolm posits an imaginary conversation between Martin Luther King and Malcolm X about Barack Obama’s inauguration as President. I will admit that I hear nothing in the music that would have led me to understand its origins, but I do find the contrast between stormy and turbulent passages that alternate with more gentle and lyrical ones to be effective and certainly appropriate to Perrault’s inspiration.

The program opens with Justin Élie’s Légende créole, a work originally composed for violin and piano and here is transposed for cello. Élie (1883–1931) studied in France and is one of Haiti’s earliest classical musicians. Légende créole is a lyrical, gentle piece; at only five minutes it would make a lovely encore to any cello recital.

Frantz Casséus (1915–1993) gained his reputation as a guitarist; Suite haïtienne was composed for guitar, then arranged for cello and piano by Julio Racine. It is based on Haitian folk tunes, one of which (“Mèsi bon Dye”) became a hit when sung by Harry Belafonte accompanied by Casséus. One can still sense the guitar origins, but the arrangement works.

To be candid, I wanted to like this disc more than I ultimately did. The chosen music is attractive and frequently tuneful. On reading the excellent program notes that accompany the recording, the collection should have had more variety and energy than it does. Whether the sameness that hangs over the program is due to the compositions or the performances is hard to say, but whatever the cause, the result is no more than moderately attractive. Golden certainly deserves credit for assembling a disc that is very possibly unique of its kind in the cello literature. However, the playing of both cellist and pianist does not seem to me to rise above the level of the ordinary.

— Henry Fogel, 5.28.2021