May 4, 2000

zydeco

You folks at Random House are quite good at finding word origins, so here is a test: Where do we get the term for zydeco music?

Zydeco music, for those of you who are not familiar with it, is a blues-influenced kind of Cajun dance music. Like a lot of fun and delicious things in Louisiana, zydeco music is the product of the multicultural tossed salad that has characterized that state's history.

Zydeco is pretty young as a music genre, first appearing in the 1940s, but its roots reach back into the rich history of the Cajun people. The Cajuns were really Acadiens, French immigrants to Acadia (present-day Nova Scotia and New Brunswick) in the 1600s. They had a nice community there for about 200 years; however, during this time, the French claim to the territory was disputed by the English. In 1713, the French government gave Acadia to the English. A variety of political and religious conflicts between the Acadians and the English ensued, and in 1755 all of these Acadian folks were expelled from the British territory. Many of them found their way to Louisiana, which was governed by the Spanish at the time. These Acadians settled in the southwest of Louisiana, and became Cajuns. (Elide the a, palatalize the glide, and denasalize the vowel. Acadien = Cajun, see?)

The Cajuns had their own music, and they shared it with their neighbors in rural Louisiana. The Cajun music was reshaped by the vocal calls of the Native Americans, the accordion (introduced by German immigrants in the 19th century), and the syncopated hand clapping and stomping (called juré) of the African-Americans (who also contributed the early frottoir, the washboard instrument in Cajun music).

In the late 1940s, Cajun music was strongly influenced by blues and jazz, and a new style--zydeco--was born. In the mid 1950s, "the king of zydeco," Clifton Chenier, recorded the song "Les haricots sont pas salés" (the green beans ain't salty). The title was a comment on hard economic times when there was no salted meat to add to the beans. It is also the origin of the word zydeco. Don't believe me? Check it out: "les haricots" is really lay za ree ko. Now, drop the "lay" because that is just the article (the) and not really part of the word. Now we've got ZA ree ko. Change the r to a d (a normal change for an intervocalic r), dipthongize the stressed vowel, and reduce the others (because that's what English likes to do), and--voilà: zydeco.

Zydeco music underwent a huge revival in the 1980s, and is enjoyed by people all over the world today. If you've never heard it, you can check out Clifton Chenier samples on Amazon.com (just scroll down the page and click).

And, as the New Orleanians say, "Laissez les bons temps rouler!" (Let the good times roll).

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