Steve Riley & The Mamou Playboys
Steve Riley grew up in Mamou where French is spoken on the street, the national holiday is Mardi Gras, and a poor family is one without a fiddler or accordion player. American popular culture was stealing Mamous children away when Steve took up the accordion and became his hometown’s favorite son. He plays a single-row diatonic instrument made by his cousin, famed accordionist Marc Savoy. Steve concentrated on learning Savoy’s fiery, intricate style and the music of the Balfa Brothers. At age 15, this young prodigy was noticed by Dewey Balfa, who invited Steve to join his band. Under Dewey’s guidance, he grew as a performer, learning hundreds of French songs and how to sing them in Balfa’s singular hurts-so-good style, and taking up the fiddle as well. In 1988, he and David Greely formed the Mamou Playboys, which rapidly gained prominence on the international folk scene without sacrificing the allegiance of Louisiana fans. In a land where accordion is king, Steve has inspired countless young men and women to follow him and keep Cajun music’s royal instrument alive.
David Greely's Cajun heritage simmered on the back burner while he was growing up near Baton Rouge. But after years of fiddling in other styles, he woke up to the music and language of his ancestors and was completely consumed. Apprenticed to Dewey Balfa, he received firsthand wisdom in Cajun music that has earned him acclaim as an eloquent Cajun French songwriter, fiddler, singer, and researcher of nearly forgotten tunes, ballads, and stories. Fascinated with Acadian history, he has traveled through France, Acadia, and Louisiana to find all the ancestral homes of his mother’s family, the Thériots. He is also actively involved in community campaigns to preserve the Cajun French language and archival Cajun recordings. In 2004, he received an “Artist Fellowship Award in Folklife” by the Louisiana Division of the Arts.
Sam Broussard grew up a city Cajun in South Louisiana, only to pick up his guitar and leave at age 19 to travel and live far and wide. A year later, he was signed to Capitol Records as part of the Louisiana group Manchild. The following years saw him touring, writing, arranging, and recording with artists such as Michael Martin Murphy, Jimmy Buffett, and European rock star Stephan Eicher, after which he returned to his birthplace to be with family.
Brazos Huval, of Breaux Bridge, is the bassist and newest Mamou Playboy. The eleventh in a family of fourteen children, he came up as a fiddler and saxophonist in the Huval Family Band, as well as bassist for Zydeco artist Horace Trahan. Although still in his early twenties, he has an unusually deep knowledge of the songs, styles and feel of Cajun and Zydeco music.
Kevin Dugas began drumming at the age of sixteen with the famed Cajun accordionist and vocalist Belton Richard. Kevin's playing is sure and full in heart and tone--the soul of the Lafayette dancehall sound. He is the Mamou Playboys’ center of gravity and the safety net for their acrobatics.
« top »
|
