Soné Ka-La Jacques Schwarz-Bart (Emarcy, B000FG5PYK)

Two of the most exciting and flavourful Caribbean jazz releases I’ve heard in recent times have come from the young French Caribbean artists Buyu Ambroise (Blues and Red) and Mario Canonge (Rhizome). Both artists have origins in islands — Ambroise in Haiti and Canonge in Martinique — with deeply entrenched folk and roots traditions which have strongly informed the popular music (think Eugène Mona, Malavoi, or Kali from Martinique, and Haiti’s Boukman Eksperyans), and both have succeeded in producing sustained works that break out of the cool, pleasant, slightly toothless groove plied by a great deal of Caribbean jazz. And now they’re joined by another young French Caribbean, this time from Guadeloupe: saxophonist Jacques Schwarz-Bart (son of the late French-Jewish writer André Schwarz-Bart and Guadeloupean writer Simone Schwarz-Bart), with his outstanding new release Soné Ka-La.

The hype surrounding this album is all about Schwarz-Bart’s marrying the rhythms of Guadeloupe’s gwoka drum traditions with all the other styles (jazz, soul, hip-hop) that influence a person of his age, time, and experience (he was a member of the touring band for American nu-soul artist D’Angelo, playing alongside the likes of trumpeter Roy Hargrove). And he does this with spectacular success. The balance Schwarz-Bart finds feels satisfyingly and organically exact, the strands woven tightly together to create what sounds almost like its own sub-genre. Schwarz-Bart’s resonant sax (he also takes turns on flute, acoustic guitar, triangle, and mouthdrums) is supported by a beautifully spare piano accompaniment, unadorned drum rhythms and percussion, wah-wah effects, hand claps, and the like — plus some fabulous vocals (in kwéyol, of course).

The vocals (which range from rapping, chanting, and snippets of conversation to vocalese-like effects) are in fact far from incidental: on tracks such as “Gwoka”, they’re a critical ingredient in a highly complex mix. Guadeloupean hip-hop star Admiral T also delivers an energetic lead vocal on “Pé La”, one of the album’s most powerful, joyous tracks, with Kassav’s Jacob Desvarieux pitching in on the bluesy “Déshabillé”. Schwarz-Bart’s mother Simone (whose voice has a gorgeous, smoky quality) offers an evocative reading of her poetry on “Léwoz”. Soné Ka-La’s more “urban” sounding tracks are slightly reminiscent of some of Roy Hargrove’s outings with his band RH Factor, notably “Drum & Bass” and the second part of “Léwoz”, a driving, “urbanised” remix based on the melody of the title track.

Jacques Schwarz-Bart has succeeded in creating an album that evokes both a traditional past and a forward-looking urban present — rural Caribbean landscapes and gritty cityscapes in almost equal measure. A huge achievement.

Georgia Popplewell

Independence Kobo Town (KOBO 001)
Tierra de la Dulce Espera La Orquesta de la Papaya (Papaya Music)

A band like Kobo Town — diasporic, multi-ethnic, genre-straddling — would always have been a source of bewilderment to marketing executives in what you might call the “1.0” version of the music in. . .

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