Cordes Et Ame ("Strings & Soul) is Emeline Michel's 6th album which features the sound of voice, drum & acoustic guitar, bathed in the various musical traditions (compa, troubadour, etc.) of Haiti, and spiced with Emeline's signature touches of jazz and world music.

There are plenty of "cordes" on this album where the multiple talents, Haiti's leading female singer, songwriter and producer, Emeline Michel makes her soul vibrates...

Rara is an important cultural expression in the haitian peasantry; the term applies to a type of music, as well as to an orchestra and to a time of the year.

Rara is very old. The word itself may come from the Yoruba adverb "rara" meaning noisy; it was used only to modify the verb "ke", meaning to make sound or noise. This festival dance was known early in the history of the colony. It may claim even an older origin.

It is reported that on "Mi-Carême" day, the Negroes of the plantations dressed in masquerade and celebrated with drums and dances. One of them carried a money basket, decorated with ribbons, suspended from a long thin bamboo pole. At midnight, after a joyful time, they appeared before the master of the plantation.

Someone would recite a speech to him; perhaps they would sing a song in his honor, and the master would place a gift of money in the beribboned money basket held forward for his convenience. Today the money basket, gaudily decorated with ribbons is an inevitable and necessary part of Rara. Usually, Rara takes place a few days before Easter after the city Carnival or Mardi-Gras. Bands of people gather together along the roads of the plains and of the hills to have fun. Each band is headed by three men playing vaccines, or bamboos, their way lighted by torches or fueled lamps; the crowds surge forward, stopping to receive money, perhaps food, at each place. Rara ends the morning of Easter Sunday.

On Rasin Kreyol which translates as "Creole Roots", the queen of Haitian song Emeline Michel covers a lot of ground, writing songs that draw upon Haitian compas, twoubadou and rara as well as jazz, rock, pop, bossa nova and samba.
Emeline Michel was born in Gonaives, Haiti on March 21st. She started with music by singing gospel at the local church. After completing high school she studied at the Detroit Jazz Center before returning to Haiti to pursue a professional career.

...La voilà la reine de la chanson créole, Emeline Michel, qui surfe allègrement sur un nouveau CD,Rasin Kreyol, concentré de soleil, de larmes, de sable, de boue, de konpa direct, de rara, de rythmes profanes et sacrés. De ces racines créoles qui trouvent encore à se nourrir dans le sol désertifié de l'île Magique. Et voilà Rasin Kreyol, un disque encore mieux fagoté, plus mature, voire un des meilleurs disques de musiques du monde en 2004...