VARIOUS ARTISTS/ LEGENDARY MASTERS OF CAJUN AND CREOLE MUSIC: Les Haricots Sont Pas Salés

Various Artists/ Legendary Masters of Cajun and Creole Music

Les Haricots Sont Pas Salés

© 1997 Various Artists/ Le gendary Masters of Cajun and Creole Music

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Historic live recordings of Cajun legends.

tracks

1 Pain de Maïs
2 La Valse de la Belle
3 Ma Négresse
4 Les Haricots Sont Pas Salés #1
5 Aux Natchitoches
6 Tu Peux Cogner
7 Two Step des Cajuns
8 Une Livre de Tabac
9 Madame Bosso
10 La Porte de la Prison
11 Les Barres de la Prison
12 Ma Chérie Bébé Créole
13 Madame Young
14 La Danse de la Limonade
15 La Veuve du Lac Bleu
16 Les Deux Cousines
17 Quoi Faire ?
18 Bosco Stomp
19 Make It To Me
20 J'ai Fais Mon Idée
21 J'ai été au Bal
22 Bonsoir Moreau
23 'Tit Galop au Mamou
24 Chère Toutoute
25 Les Maringouins
26 Les Haricots Sont Pas Salés #2
27 Le Two Step à Jules

notes

NEW! See and hear some of the great performers of this album on a brand new DVD untitled DEDANS LE SUD DE LA LOUISIANE. Shot in Louisiana in 1972, this film has been recently restored and is available at Film Baby, CD Baby's sister company. Just click on Film Baby at the bottom of this page.

Review published in "Flagpole", Athens, GA and written by Jim Winders, History Professor at Appalachian State University, Boone, NC.

Various Artists
Les Haricots sont pas sales: Legendary Masters of Cajun and Creole Music
Cinq Planetes

This record is simply the finest collection of traditional Cajun and Creole music you will ever hear and, if you care about the music once derided as "chanky-chank," you will bend heaven and earth to get this record. The title, Les Haricot sont pas sale means "the snap beans aren't salty;" the term "zydeco" derives from an approximation of the way the first two words sound in French. The 27 tracks within feature some of the greatest legends of Louisiana music: Nathan Abshire, The Balfa Brothers, Dennis McGee, Canray Fontenot, and Alphonse "Bois Sec" Ardoin, among others. Most are now dead, and these recordings took place in the early 1970s, just in time to preserve the work of several of them. This was also a time when the music was thought to be in danger of disappearing altogether, a threat much on the mind of Jean-Pierre Bruneau, the producer who ventured into the Bayou country to put these sessions together.
The cover photograph features Bee Fontenot, a gruff-voiced button accordion player who died in 1973. You can't hear him anywhere else, and he is simply great. One of the high points in the album is his performance of "La porte de la prison." You also get to hear a bit of conversation between him and Dewey Balfa about the song. It's immediately followed by a similarly-themed tune, "Les barres de la prison" by Canray Fontenot. Fiddle great Dennis McGee performs two fine numbers, and there are three great ones by Nathan Abshire. And the Balfas are hard to beat.
All of the musicians seemed to give Bruneau their best, and it doesn't let up for almost 80 minutes. The exquisite packaging, notes, and photography almost make up for the way you miss those old great vinyl album covers. This is the one Cajun CD to get if you just want one.


Review published in "Cajun Times Online!" January 1998 and written by John Layton:

This CD features a mixture of classic Cajun and Creole Music recorded live in Basile and Mamou in the early seventies. The list of legendary musicians playing in the informal sessions reads like a who's who of Cajun music. There are ten or so tracks from The Balfa Brothers and Nathan Abshire and other tracks from Shirley and Alphee Bergeron, Canray Fontenot, Alphonse Ardoin, Dennis McGee and Sady Courville. Some of the best music on the record comme from Canray's cousins, the Creole accordionists, Freeman and Bee Fontenot.

reviews

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  • Excellent historical record
    author: Henk Milne

    I was researching the roots of Celtic music in the Americas - including the music of the French Celtic "Acadians - for tunes to add to my own band's "American Celtic" repertoire (The Volunteers - two CDs on CDbaby) and came across this CD. Just great "raw footage" of parlor performances of seminal tunes in the genre. A real gem.

  • author: CD Baby

    A historic, live recording from the early 70's of legendary Cajun musicians such as The Balfa Brothers and Nathan Abshire, Shirley and Alphee Bergeron, Canray Fontenot, Alphonse Ardoin, and more. With excellent production and relentless musicianship, the richness of full instrumentals, including fiddles, guitar, accordion and French vocals, will jump start your ticker and warm your blood like cayenne pepper.

  • author: Tamara Turner, CD Baby

    A historic, live recording from the early 70's of legendary Cajun musicians such as The Balfa Brothers and Nathan Abshire, Shirley and Alphee Bergeron, Canray Fontenot, Alphonse Ardoin, and more. With excellent production and relentless musicianship, the richness of full instrumentals, including fiddles, guitar, accordion and French vocals, will jump start your ticker and warm your blood like cayenne pepper

  • An important collection for the serious fan or audiophile
    author: Steve Edmiston

    Somehow Jean-Pierre Bruneau found his way to South Louisiana in 1972 when Cajun and Zydeco music were all but despised locally and unheard of outside of the Newport Festival. I, for example, was raised to consider the local music as noise to be ridiculed. There were no local events to honor the genres or celebrate them other than the traditional faisdodos in the regional dancehalls which were attended only by Cajuns and Creoles. How a Frenchman found this island of subculture and what possessed him to make something of it was for the longest beyond my understanding. I'll cut to the chase--If you've ever lamented that so much of this music is lost forever; if you've ever wished you could travel in time and capture just one of those lost moments; buy this disk. There are 27 such moments on it. Jean-Pierre, mon cher, je te remercie. Now if the film were only available on DVD...

  • "the top ten of recommended Cajun and Créole recordings."
    author: Review published in "Blues & Rhythm Magazine", issue # 136, an

    "These recordings were made in 1972 by film director Jean-Pierre Bruneau who was then shooting footage that became "Dedans le Sud de la Louisiane." When that documentary came out, I recall a Cajun newsletter describing it approvingly as the first film to consider the music in terms of the culture, rather than the culture in terms of the music. It was a memorable experience, both musically and visually; I can still recall Nathan Abshire's belly rolling theatrics 25 years later. In 1972 the giants of Créole and Cajun Music - Nathan Abshire, the Balfas, Canray Fontenot, the Bergerons père et fils, and the rest - were still with us, and playing music that was local and functional, not yet either a bayou tourist attraction or part of the club mix from Twickenham to Tokyo. As such it was a deeper, fiercer music than is often heard today; I've seldom heard a more relentless five minutes of dance music than the disciplined riot that is "Bosco Stomp" played by a supergroup of les frères Balfa, Nathan Abshire, Bois-Sec Ardoin, Canray Fontenot, and banjoist Terry Bertrand. Alongside the wonderful renditions of well known pieces like Abshire's "Ma Négresse" and "Madame Young" (aka "Colinda"), by Dennis Mc Gee, then a stripling of 79, there are a number of other unusual and rare items. Perhaps the most remarkable is "La Veuve du Lac Bleu", clearly a French French Song (if you see what I mean) and plausibly claimed to be 300 to 400 years old. The Deshotels twins sing it in haunting harmony. Of primary importance for students of Black music will be the only recordings of Bee Fontenot, whose tough, wheaterbeaten features and early flat-top haircut make a memorable cover picture. His front-porch session, held a few months before he died, confirms Michael Doucet's assessment of him as "the bluesiest accordion player under the sun" and in "Pain de Maïs" ("Cornbread") it includes a masterpiece of pre-zydeco black music.. Dewey Balfa plays triangle on that title, and the CD includes a number of other interracial encounters. A magnificent CD which goes straight into the top ten of recommended Cajun and Créole recordings."

  • a must for any Cajun fanatic
    author: Review published in "Cajun Times Online!" January 1998 and wri

    "This CD features a mixture of classic Cajun and Creole Music recorded live in Basile and Mamou in the early seventies. The list of legendary musicians playing in the informal sessions reads like a who's who of Cajun music. There are ten or so tracks from The Balfa Brothers and Nathan Abshire and other tracks from Shirley and Alphee Bergeron, Canray Fontenot, Alphonse Ardoin, Dennis McGee and Sady Courville. Some of the best music on the record comme from Canray's cousins, the Creole accordionists, Freeman and Bee Fontenot. These rare recordings of Bee Fontenot's bluesey accordion style and booming baritone voice bring to life a musician that up to now I have only been able to read about. For me, this is the best record of 1997 and is a must for any Cajun fanatic".

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