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CAT ISLAND, THE BAHAMAS

Cat Island is heralded as one of the islands that is steeped in its rich cultural heritage. Islanders by way of their ancestry hold onto various traditions that lend them selves to an understanding of the Indian, English and Spanish influences that has shaped the community in being uniquely Cat Island family.

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OUR STORY

Celebrating and preserving the indigenous musical culture of The Bahamas called Rake & Scrape.  An amalgamation of the three dominant cultures Indian, Arawak/Lucayan; European and African, which is evident in the music.  The African goatskin drum, the European concertina or ‘squeeze box’ and the ingenuity of the Bahamian scraping the carpenter saw with animal jaw bone, knife or screw driver, accompanied with the Indians’ gourds, calabash and coconut shells.  There are also dances that accompany the Rake & Scrape music called the quadrille, the heel toe, the round back, and polka dances.

‘In the first half the nineteenth century, masters in The Bahamas eagerly embraced the Set Dances of Europe that had become popular on both sides of the Atlantic.  Their slaves followed suit, perhaps eager to show the sameness of the human species regardless of skin colour.  But long after the masters had moved on to more fashionable diversions, the slaves in the small settlements of isolated islands adopted the dances as their as their very own, coloured them with a distinctive African spirit, and time-capsuled they became.’

‘Rake & Scrape moves in the inner depths of our soul and seeps to the surface. The trickle becomes a flood; surging tide that pours through our body, and eventually erupts in unique and inimitable expressions.  It is the African compulsion for music and dance.  In a brutal world where humanness was a luxury denied, Music & Dance became lifelines to reality… partners in a dance of survival… embedded in the besieged identity of slaves brought from Africa to The Bahamas.  This music, the ‘bastard’ child of Bahamian music, was regarded for decades as music worthy only of the ‘lower classes.’ writes Arlene Nash Ferguson.

Today Rake N’ Scrape music is almost identical to Rip Saw’ music of the Turks & Caicos.  Rake N’ Scrape music is reported to have its roots in Cat Island’ says Smithsonian Folk life, 1995.

RAKE 'N SCRAPE

Rake ’n Scrape by all standards is a way of life and expression of native Cat Is-landers and has been adopted by so many others both domestically and internationally.

Some 19 years ago I had the opportunity of serving as one of the first members of the very first Cat Island Rake N Scrape Festival Committee and do know and can ap-preciate the sacrifices of so many persons during that time to the present.

Again this year the Cat Island Rake N Scrape Festival Committee, along with its members and the community, has worked diligently having partnered with so many in having this year’s festival realized.

Congratulations are in order to Ms. Kay Chriswell and her Executive Team along with its members and numerous volunteers.

To our visitors welcome to God’s good land as our 2018 district theme denotes “One Island, One People, One Voice!”

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