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Connections Out
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from this node by:
Augmented Intelligence
Network Node
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Name:
Cedric Watson
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City/Place:
Lafayette, Louisiana
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Country:
United States
Life & Work
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Bio:
One of the brightest young talents to emerge in Cajun, Creole and Zydeco (Louisiana French) music over the last decade, Cedric Watson is a four-time Grammy-nominated fiddler, singer, accordionist & songwriter with seemingly unlimited potential.
Originally from San Felipe, TX (population 868), Cedric made his first appearance at the age of 19 at the Zydeco Jam at The Big Easy in Houston, TX. Just two years later, he moved to south Louisiana, quickly immersing himself in French music and language. Over the next several years, Cedric performed French music in 17 countries and on 7 full-length albums with various groups, including the Pine Leaf Boys, Corey Ledet, Les Amis Creole with Ed Poullard and J.B. Adams, and with his own group, Bijou Creole.
Cedric Watson & Bijou Creole resurrect the ancient sounds of the French and Spanish contra dance and bourré alongside the spiritual rhythms of the Congo tribes of West Africa, who were sold as slaves in the Carribean and Louisiana by the French and Spanish.
With an apparently bottomless repertoire of songs at his fingertips, Cedric plays everything from forgotten Creole melodies and obscure Dennis McGee reels to more modern Cajun and Zydeco songs, even occasionally throwing in a bluegrass fiddle tune or an old string band number. Unlike many of his contemporaries, he is also a prolific songwriter, writing almost all of his songs on his double row Hohner accordion. Cedric’s songs channel his diverse ancestry (African, French, Native American and Spanish) to create his own brand of sounds.
Cedric’s albums are a tapestry of pulsing rhythms and Creole poetry, and his live performances are unforgettable, all at once progressive and nostalgic.
More
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Quotes, Notes & Etc.
“We don’t want to forget that one of the biggest contributions to our culture, music and heritage was made by the Native Americans. I find that the old Zydeco rhythms sound like a mix of African and Native American ceremonial rhythms. This mélange very possibly came about through the intermingling of the Native American population and the Maroons.”
– Cedric Watson
“I’m sure Canray [Fontenot] is smiling (with his wonderful wall-to-wall smile) down on Cedric whenever he picks up a fiddle.”
– Jeanie McLerie | The Old-Time Herald, Chapel Hill, NC
“Few recordings in the Cajun and Creole fiefdom have ever run the gamut quite like this…”
– Dan Willgng | Offbeat Magazine, New Orleans, LA
“Fiddler Cedric Watson moves like a star and gets the girls screaming”
– Songlines | London, UK
“An aggressive and gifted reanimator of Louisiana Creole music”
– New York Times | New York City, NY
Clips (more may be added)
Thank you for your note below and we appreciate you including Kamasi in the matrix, Sparrow. — Banch Abegaze (manager: Kamasi Washington)
KAMASI WASHINGTON
Dear Sparrow: I am thrilled to receive your email! Thank you for including me in this wonderful matrix. — Susan Rogers (personal recording engineer for Prince; recorded "Purple Rain", "Around the World in a Day", "Parade", "Sign o' the Times"... recorded David Byrne and others, much else; now is director of the Berklee Music Perception and Cognition Laboratory)
SUSAN ROGERS
Dear Sparrow, Many thanks for this – I am touched! — Julian Lloyd Webber (cellist; brother of Andrew Lloyd Webber (Evita, Jesus Christ Superstar, Cats, Phantom of the Opera...)
JULIAN LLOYD WEBBER
This is super impressive work ! Congratulations ! Thanks for including me :))) — Clarice Assad (pianist and composer; works performed by Yo Yo Ma and orchestras around the world)
CLARICE ASSAD
Thanks, this is a brilliant idea!! — Alicia Svigals (world's premier klezmer violinist)
ALICIA SVIGALS
I'm Sparrow. I built this matrix so that every creator on the planet would be conceivably findable and accessible from all others, beginning with musicians in Bahia, Brazil. The matrix combines recommendation by both artificial and human intelligence (human preferred) and the small-world phenomenon (responsible for the fact that most humans are within 6 steps of most others) in a simple but powerful manner which has never been used before.
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