Acadia

Provinces: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, Québec.

The areas southeast of the Lower St Lawrence River and on the Bay of Fundy, once called New France, are now known as "Acadia". Many sections of this land which has been developed by man over the centuries now belong to the Canadian Atlantic Provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island - in some parts of which old French is still spoken - and to the French-speaking province of Québec and the U.S. state of Maine.

History

In 1604 Samuel de Champlain and his companions landed on Docher's Island, now Maine in the United States. They founded a colony here, which was moved the following year to a sheltered bay on the eastern side of the Bay of Fundy (now Annapolis in Nova Scotia). The new colony was named Port Royal. This new, rapidly developing French colony was attacked as early as 1613 by British troops, and subsequently ownership alternated between France and England. In 1632 it was returned to France and remained so for some time. Civil war-like conditions provided the opportunity for the British to take it over again between 1654 and 1667. Under the Treaty of Breda Acadia was returned to France. In 1710 British and Scottish troops seized Port Royal and renamed it Annapolis, after the Scottish Queen Anne Stuart.

Under the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 the larger part of Nova Scotia was ceded to England, while Cape Breton Island, New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island remained French. Shortly before the outbreak of the Seven Years' War the 10,000 or so French settlers were deported from Acadia by the English governor and scattered in small groups in other British possessions. Some made a new home for themselves in Louisiana or in the West Indies. Finally, under the terms of the Treaty of Paris in 1763, the whole of Canada came under the rule of the British monarchy.

Acadia Today

The French-speaking descendants of the Acadian settlers are now scattered in pockets in Canada. Some still live in the Edmundston area and along the middle course of the St John River, as well as along the boundary with the USA, with many others scattered along the Atlantic coast between Moncton and the Baie des Chaleurs and the Gaspésie. Small settlements are also to be found on the south-west coast of Cape Breton, on the Île Madame, near Chéticamp on the north-west coast of Nova Scotia, in the west of Prince Edward Island and on the Îles de la Madeleine.

Cajun Music

Cajun music combines elements of American "hillbilly" and square dance tempos with music introduced by settlers from Normandy and Brittany. This music has become very popular in Canada and is now spreading to Europe as well. The main instruments used are the accordion and violin with suitable song accompaniment.

Cajun music is basically French-American folk-music which originated in Louisiana in the early 19th c. "Cajuns" is the name given to those French-Canadians who, after 1775, left their homeland of Acadia (the present Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick) and moved to Louisiana.

Originally Cajun music was purely French folk music, but it has absorbed an increasing number of English and West African elements and is now strongly influenced by "blues" music from the southern states of the USA. For a long time the fiddle was the dominant instrument, but the accordion and triangle now play an increasingly important role. Modern Cajun bands, influenced by commercial country and western trends, often add electric guitars and percussion instruments.

The first records were made in 1928, when the accordionist Joe Falcon played "Allons à Lafayette". With that title he paid tribute to one of the most important centers of Cajun music in Louisiana, the town of Lafayette. Cajun music spread further afield mainly through the influence of Clifton Chenier (1925-87) who, in the opinion of the musical magazine "Rolling Stone", was the best Acadian accordionist in the world. At the end of the 1970s Chenier and his "Red Hot Louisiana Band" went to Europe and played at the Montreux Festival.

Elements of Cajun music can be found today mainly in the mainstream country and western style.