*Down In The Bayous In Cajun Country- “The French Blues”- Waylon Thibodeaux

Click On Title To Link To YouTube's Film Clip Of Waylon Thibodeaux.

CD REVIEW

The introductory paragraphs in this review have been used to review other Cajun CDs in this space.

Well, it is about time that I started to review some of the work of the good old boys and girls from the bayous down in Cajun country. Places like Lafayette and Lake Charles evoke memories of time and place in Cajun musical history. You know at the edges of the places where the likes of Hank Williams and Jerry Lee Lewis learned their crafts. And places where all kinds of mixes of music and races blended to form unique sounds all their own. Accordions, washboards, fiddles, guitars and what ever came to hand on those whiskey-drenched Saturday nights.

And on those nights come names like Clifton Chenier and Booboo Chavis that form the black-influenced strand of the music. The Hackberry Ramblers and the likes of Waylon Thibodeaux form another, the good old white boys. French Acadian exiles, English “swamp foxes” of undetermined origin, black escaped slaves, “poor white trash”- it is all there mixed in one form or another. For the most part there were no serious conscious attempts to mix the strands but how could the intermixing influences be avoided in that small isolated area of southwest Louisiana. And all under the umbrella of what I call the “French blues”. Get your dancing slippers on.


Best Of Cajun; The Traditional Songs Featuring Waylon Thibodeaux, Waylon Thibodeaux and various artists, Mardi Gras Records,

I have pointed out above the good old boy Saturday night barn dance tradition in Cajun country. The central instrument is many times the fiddle when there is no accordion around. Waylon Thibodeaux and his masterful fiddle are featured here on some Cajun classics. I note the virtual Cajun anthem “Jolie Blonde”, “Lake Charles Two Step” (that will get you up and dancing) and another familiar Cajun classic “Grand Mamou”