Fiddles on Friday XII

Is there a cajun fiddler in the house? Yes there is, today it's up to Michael Doucet

Michael Doucet is a Cajun fiddler, singer and songwriter who founded the Cajun band BeauSoleil from Lafayette, Louisiana. He learned the banjo by age six, the guitar by his eighth year, and was researching Cajun music as a college student. In his youth he performed as part of a duo at a music festival in France. At the festival he was exposed to centuries-old French music, which he identified with the Cajun music of French Louisiana. Doucet's individual style incorporated elements of Western swing, 1930’s string band and Creole music, into traditional Cajun music. Doucet learned late 19th century and 20th century tunes passed on by McGee. He revived many the old Cajun songs that had not been recorded and whose musicians of that era were gone. Let's take a look at a gig with David Doucet and Mitchell Reed, at the 2007 Smithsonian Folklife Festival In 1977, Doucet started educating public school children about Cajun music. Later as an adjunct professor at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, he designed and taught the first university course on Cajun music. Doucet was originally a member of the mid-1970s Cajun/rock band called Coteau. During that same time some of his friends and he formed his current band, BeauSoleil, which was purer to Cajun musical tradition. He also performs with the bands Fiddlers 4 and The Savoy-Doucet Cajun Band (with Marc Savoy). But it's not only Cajun. I have found this beautiful song "Everything I Do Gonna Be Funky" from his album "From now on" And to end with, here are some tracks "Chanson pour Ezra" and as Christmas is approaching some tracks from "a Cajun Christmas" have a merry Michael :)