Indo-Caribbeans celebrating their Indian heritage through music and dance in the 19th century ¹

Background

Chutney music, originating in Guyana and Trinidad, has its roots in Indian Bhojpuri folk music that was brought by Indo-Caribbean indentured servants in the 19th century and other Caribbean genres such as calypso and soca. Originally, chutney lyrics were typically religious and it was played with the harmonium (an organlike keyboard instrument) and dholak (a barrel-shaped Indian drum). Over the years, chutney has integrated African influenced rhythms and has been able to reach Afro-Caribbean audiences.² It has increasingly become popular among the Caribbean diaspora in the United States, Canada, and the U.K..

Here is a sample of chutney music:

In this song above, you can hear the elements of both Indian Bollywood music in the song and characteristics of local Caribbean forms of music such as soca in its fast-paced dance rhythm. While as previously mentioned the lyrics used to be mainly religious, they are now usually about love or drinking.

Though Hindi is often incorporated in chutney music, most Indo-Caribbean people do not speak Hindi fluently. In New York, where Indo-Caribbean immigrants from Guyana and Trinidad find themselves near South Asian immigrants in neighborhoods such as Richmond Hill in Queens, this linguistic difference becomes a barrier for Indo-Caribbeans from being accepted into the South Asian community. In the article, “Chutney and Indo-Trinidadian Cultural Identity”, Peter Manuel, an ethnomusicologist at the City University of New York who has studied music in the West Indies, describes how when Indo-Caribbeans encounter Asian Indians in clubs in New York City, they are often looked down upon as “deculturated outcastes who cannot even speak Hindi” (Manuel 31)³. However, it is through music that Indo-Caribbeans have been able to close the divide between the two groups. Although chutney has evolved so much under the diverse musical influences in the Caribbean, it has been able to hold onto pieces of traditional Indian folk music and prevent it from becoming submerged under modern forms of music, especially in diaspora communities in New York City where there is often the pressure to adapt to westernization.

Chutney’s Reach in New York

One of the things that distinguishes New York City from most other places where the Caribbean diaspora has settled is the popularity of Indo-Caribbean music. In most other areas with large numbers of Caribbean migrants such as London, chutney has barely been able to spread beyond people of Guyanese and Trinidadian decent. New York City has been able to serve as a platform for Guyanese and Trinidadian artists to spread their music ⁴. It has gained popularity among both Afro-Caribbean and even non-Caribbean people. In fact, chutney artists Rikki Jai and Ravi B were featured on NPR’s All Things Considered, playing on radios all throughout New York City. In the podcast, reporter Ike Sriskandarajah explains how Rikki Jai played in Queens, New York for an international immigrant audience. Although chutney’s popularity has mostly stuck to Guyanese and Trinidadian people, having New York City’s population as an audience allows it to reach a more diverse group of listeners. ⁵

Every year, the Guyana Heritage Festival is held in Roy Wilkins Park in Queens, New York. Above is an excerpt from the Saturday morning program on Wee Radio, a Indo-Caribbean Radio based in Flushing, NY, in which the hosts discuss the event with one of the performers, Ranjeev Ramdeen, a chutney singer:

As mentioned in this clip from the radio, such Indo-Caribbean events where chutney is performed allow both Guyanese and Trinidadian people to connect over music. Ranjeev Ramdeen, who is Trinidadian, mentions how many of his listeners are Guyanese and how performing in New York allows him to reach both New Yorkers of Guyanese and Trinidadian descent simultaneously. Such events allow the Indo-Caribbean population to hear familiar sounds while being surrounded by familiar food and people, to help connect them back to their lives back home. In addition, these types of events help Indo-Caribbean artists expose their music to a wider audience. When advertising the event, the hosts of the radio tell the listeners to not only bring other Guyanese people, but also non-Guyanese people to show them a different culture ⁶.

While chutney music has greatly changed since its beginnings, its ability to both preserve aspects of traditional folk music and incorporate external influences have allowed the Indo-Caribbean diaspora to use their music to connect with people outside their community.