In Partnership with New Music USA:
Annual ‘Bringing The Water’ Award
The ‘Bringing The Water’ Award is an annual award to honor the profound influence and benefit to past and future folk music innovators by Black American musical artists. I hope to grow this award across the years, and begin it as a deep bow to the lineage of Leadbelly, Harry Belafonte and Sweet Honey in the Rock. They represent the many, many charismatic, communicative Black American artists who, in addition to their towering performance and recording achievements, educate and share their culture with astonishing generosity amidst ongoing systemic racism, cultural appropriation and personal hardship.
“Bring Me Little Water, Silvy” like so many folk songs, has the resilience and universality to hold the creative impulses of new generations. The arrangement I made with body percussion by Evie Ladin is just one step in the evolution of a deeply lovable song.
I’m thrilled to be in partnership with New Music USA and join with their powerful support of new music. This space will be updated with news of the annual award recipients and resources for creating positive change in the music business, a field with a history of appropriation. I hope this award will be a positive way to build support for new Black creators, my colleagues and the young artists to come.
Leyla McCalla
2023 Recipient
Leyla McCalla is a New York-born Haitian-American living in New Orleans, who sings in French, Haitian Creole, and English, and plays cello, tenor banjo, and guitar. Deeply influenced by traditional Creole, Cajun, and Haitian music, as well as by American jazz and folk, her music is at once earthy, elegant, soulful, and witty — it vibrates with three centuries of history, yet also feels strikingly fresh, distinctive, and contemporary. McCalla’s debut album, Vari-Colored Songs: A Tribute to Langston Hughes, was named 2013’s Album of the Year by the London Sunday Times and Songlines magazine. It was followed by the critically acclaimed 2016 album A Day for the Hunter, A Day for the Prey, an extended exploration of the themes of social justice and pan-African consciousness that marked her debut. In January 2019, McCalla released Capitalist Blues, her first full-band album, which examines, through McCalla’s eyes, the divided sociopolitical climate in the United States.
Her latest project Breaking the Thermometer is inspired by the legacy of Radio Haiti-Inter, Haiti’s first independent radio station to broadcast news in Haitian Creole—the voice of the people—until the assassination of the station’s founder, Jean Dominque. The title is derived from a proverb used by Dominique to describe the spirit of Haiti’s marginalized poor in the face of violence and political oppression. Directed by renowned theater director Kiyoko McCrae, the work weaves together arrangements of Haitian songs, traditional dances, audio and video recordings from Duke’s Radio Haiti Archive, and Leyla’s own personal storytelling. Through this juxtaposition of voices — the personal and political, the anecdotal and the journalistic — McCalla gives expression to the enduring spirit of Haiti’s people.
“Bring Me Little Water, Silvy” Lineage
Leadbelly: – “Bring Me Little Water, Silvy”
Harry Belafonte – “Sylvie”
Sweet Honey in the Rock – “Bring Me Little Water, Sylvie”
Moira Smiley – “Bring Me Little Water, Silvy”