The music, history, style and poetry of the Caribbean are explored in
CaribbeanTales, a series of diverse documentaries making their New York City television premieres exclusively on CUNY TV throughout the month of June 2012, coinciding with National Caribbean American Heritage Month (June) and Caribbean Week in New York (June 4-9).
CUNY TV is seen in New York City on Ch. 75 (Time Warner and Cablevision systems), Ch. 77 (RCN Cable) or Ch. 30 (Verizon FiOS). These films will not be available online.
CaribbeanTales - Calypso Dreams
Friday, June 1 at 7 AM, 1 PM and 10 PM
Sunday, June 3 at 4 PM
An acclaimed 2008 film chronicling the traditions of calypso music dating back to its roots in the 18th and 19th centuries, Calypso Dreams pays homage with contemporary interviews, rare photographs, and archival music clips. Harry Belafonte, Mighty Sparrow, Calypso Rose, Lord Kitchener, Lord Pretender, Brigo, Mystic Prowler, Calypso Rose, Valentino, Conqueror, and many others are featured.
Narrated by Caribbean musician David Rudder, Calypso Dreams was produced over a three-year period in Port of Spain, Trinidad, and provides a cultural rediscovery of a musical tradition bypassed by the mainstream for decades. (2008/Trinidad, 60 min., color) Directors: Geoffrey Dunn and Michael Horne.
CaribbeanTales - I Is A Long Memoried Woman
Friday, June 8 at 7 AM, 1 PM and 10 PM
Sunday, June 10 at 6:30 PM
Grace Nichols’ collection of poems, I Is A Long Memoried Woman, tells the story of a young African woman uprooted from her homeland and transported to slavery in the Caribbean. Drawing inspiration from her sisters and brothers – the Amerindians and the Maroon Warriors of the Haitian Revolution – she resolves to take action. With re-remembered African goddesses and gods, she claims her identity out of sorrow and pain, and welcomes victory by liberating herself and beginning the process of healing.
In the film, the poems are performed by Adjoa Andoh, portraying the young girl painfully attempting to come to terms with her enforced reality, and Leonie Forbes, as a mature woman who has seen and survived all. The dramatic narration is juxtaposed with dance sequences performed by Malisha Adlum, Eusebia Suffren and Steve Wright, along with archival stills of enslavement and revolt. (1990/England, 50 min., color, documentary/performance) Director: Frances-Anne Solomon.
CaribbeanTales - Mas Man
Friday, June 15 at 7 AM, 1 PM and 10 PM
Sunday, June 17 at 4 PM
“Mas man” is a colloquial term for “carnival artist.” This film is a profile of Peter Minshall, a prominent artist born in 1941, who has created elaborate carnival costumes and masks for Trinidad’s annual spring festival. Minshall’s mobile street theatre, comprising 2,500 masqueraders, led to the invitations by the Olympic Games to create the Opening Ceremonies in Barcelona (1992), Atlanta (1996) and Salt Lake City (2002). (2010/U.S.-Trinidad, 56 min.) Director: Dalton Narine.
CaribbeanTales - Crossing Over
Friday, June 22 at 7 AM, 1 PM and 10 PM
Sunday, June 24 at 4 PM
Crossing Over is a classic film that bridges a gap between African and Caribbean history when calypsonian Lancelot Layne visits West Africa’s Ghana – the land of his ancestors – and explores the roots of Highlife music with Ghanaian musician Koo Nimo. Nimo then visits Lancelot in Trinidad to experience calypso, meeting the legendary calypsonian Lord Kitchener. Adapted from a two-part documentary. (1988/Trinidad & Tobago, 60 min., color) Directors: Christopher Laird and Nii Bampoe Ado.
CaribbeanTales - Reunion: West Indian Women at War and Louise Bennett: Miss Lou Then and Now
Friday, June 29 at 7 AM, 1 PM and 10 PM
Sunday, July 1 at 4 PM
Reunion: West Indian Women at War is a film about a reunion of West Indian women who served in a special branch of the British Army during World War II.
It took the British War Office two years of infighting to allow 300 Caribbean women of color to join the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS), a branch of the British army, so that male soldiers could leave their desk duties to go to the Front.
The five participants’ exuberant pleasure in reliving their comradeship — going through parade-ground drills, and singing “Hitler Has Only Got One Ball” — is infectious. There is one woman's drily told tale of giving a pint of blood to a wounded man who, when he saw her, was terrified that he might one day sire a black baby. (1993/UK, 30 min., color, documentary) Director: Frances-Anne Solomon.
The companion film, Louise Bennett: Miss Lou Then and Now is about Louise Bennett-Covelly, a Jamaican folklorist, playwright and poet who has spent her life furthering the Jamaican language, raising the patois dialect to art. This portrait moves back and forth between her early days in Jamaica and her later years in Canada. (2009, 30 min., documentary) Directed by Frances-Anne Solomon, Leonie Forbes and Regan MacAulay.
About City University Television, Cable Channel 75 in New York
CUNY TV, the noncommercial cable television station of the City University of New York, is the largest public university television station in the U.S. Our mission is to extend the educational activities within the University beyond its 23 campuses to all New Yorkers, and to reflect the diverse needs and opinions of its faculty and students. Established in 1985, the station is carried in the five boroughs of New York, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Our original programs can also be viewed and heard online at www.cuny.tv. For more information : http://www.cuny.tv
