| Mento | |
|---|---|
| Stylistic origins | |
| Cultural origins | Late 19th century,Jamaica |
| Derivative forms | Ska |
Mento is a style ofJamaicanfolk music that predates and has greatly influencedska andreggae music.[2] It is a fusion of African rhythmic elements and European elements, which reached peak popularity in the 1940s and 1950s.[3] Mento typically features acoustic instruments, such asacoustic guitar,banjo,hand drums, and therhumba box — a largembira in the shape of a box that can be sat on while played. The rhumba box carries thebass part of the music.
Mento is often confused withcalypso, a musical form fromTrinidad and Tobago. Although the two share many similarities, they are separate and distinct musical forms. During the mid-20th century, mento was conflated with calypso, and mento was frequentlyreferred to ascalypso,kalypso andmento calypso.[4] Mento singers frequently used calypso songs and techniques. As in calypso, mento uses topical lyrics with a humorous slant, commenting on poverty and other social issues.[4] Sexual innuendo is also common.
Mento draws on musical traditions brought by enslavedWest Africa people.[4] Enslaved musicians were often required to play music for their masters and often rewarded for such skills.[4] The Africans created a creole music, incorporating such elements of these traditions, includingquadrille, into their ownfolk music.[4][5]
The Jamaican mento style has a long history of conflation with Trinidadiancalypso. The lyrics of mento songs often deal with aspects of everyday life in a light-hearted and humorous way. Many comment on poverty, poor housing, and other social issues. Thinly veiled sexual references andinnuendo are also common. Mento can be seen as a precursor of some of the movement motifs and themes dealing with such social issues found in moderndancehall. It became more popular in the late 1940s, with mento performances becoming a common aspect of dances, parties and other events in Jamaica.[5]
The wordmento is of uncertainetymology; it may be from anAfrican language orCuban Spanish;Rex Nettleford said the term was brought back fromCuba by Jamaicans returning from work there.[6] Supposedly, it derives from the Spanish verbmentar, "to mention, call out, name", because of the subtle ways that lyrics criticised people (whether fellow blacks, or the whites who were in charge).[7][8]
Major 1950s mento recording artists includeLouise Bennett,Count Lasher,Count Owen,Harold Richardson,Lord Flea,Lord Fly,Alerth Bedasse withChin's Calypso Sextet,Laurel Aitken,Denzil Laing,Lord Composer,Lord Lebby,Lord Power,Hubert Porter, andHarry Belafonte, a New Yorker of Jamaican origin. His wildly popular hit records in 1956–1958, including "Day-O (The Banana Boat Song)" and "Jamaica Farewell", were mento songs sold as calypso. Previously recorded Jamaican versions of many Belafonte's classic "calypso" hits can be heard on theJamaica – Mento 1951–1958 CD released by Frémeaux & Associés in 2009.[9]
Due in part to Belafonte's popularity, mento became widely conflated with calypso in the 1950s. In a 1957 interview forCalypso Star magazine,Lord Flea said:
In Jamaica, we call our music 'mento' until very recently. Today, 'calypso' is beginning to be used forall kinds of West Indian music. This is because it's become so commercialized there. Some people like to think of West Indians as carefree natives who work and sing and play and laugh their lives away. But this isn't so. Most of the people there are hard working folks, and many of them are smart business men. If the tourists want 'calypso', that's what we sell them.[10]
This was the golden age of mento, as records pressed byStanley Motta,Ivan Chin,Ken Khouri and others brought the music to a new audience. In the 1960s it became overshadowed byska and reggae. Mento is still played in Jamaica, especially in areas frequented by tourists.Lloyd Bradley, reggae historian and author of the seminal reggae book,Bass Culture, said thatLee "Scratch" Perry's seminal 1976dub album,Super Ape, contained some of the purest mento influences he knew.[11] This style of music was revived in popularity by theJolly Boys in the late 1980s and early 1990s with the release of four recordings onFirst Warning Records/Rykodisc and a tour that included theUnited States.[5]Stanley Beckford and Gilzene and the Blue Light Mento Band also revived rural mento in the 2000s. The mento dance is a Jamaican folk-form dance with acoustic guitar, banjo, hand drums and rhumba box.
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