REMEMBERING KOJO: HISTORY, MUSIC, AND GENDER IN THE JANUARY SIXTH CELEBRATION OF THE JAMAICAN ACCOMPONG MAROONS.

The January Sixth celebration of the Maroons of Accompong, Jamaica, commemorates both the birth of the Maroon leader, Kojo (Cudjoe),(1) and his victory over the British, which resulted in the signing of the peace treaty of 1739. The Accompong Maroons(2) are descendants of Africans taken to Jamaica in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries who successfully resisted enslavement by the British rulers of the island and settled in a remote, mountainous region called the Cockpit Country. Accompong is a town of about 1,600 inhabitants located in St. Elizabeth parish in the western part of Jamaica approximately thirty-five miles southeast of Montego Bay.

Much research has been done on various Maroon groups in the West Indies and Latin America, and literature on the Accompong (or Leeward) Maroons is particularly plentiful because of their dramatic and turbulent history. However, except for the work of Kenneth M. Bilby, whose research focuses primarily on groups in eastern Jamaica, studies of Jamaican Maroon music are rare. Fragments of information about the music of Accompong Maroons appear in several works, but a comprehensive study on musical traditions of the Leeward Maroons is lacking.(3)

The January Sixth celebration does not represent the retention of a specific African festival or event. It is a performance tradition that originated in Jamaica, but the music and dance performed at this event clearly are African-derived. My primary focus here is not to identify the resilience or maintenance of African practices, although a strong argument can be made for approaching the subject in this way. Instead, I will examine how the Accompong Maroons, in the process of adapting to their new environment, integrated features from a variety of African and European traditions to create a musical culture that asserted their distinctive Maroon identity.(4) As Barbara Klamon Kopytoff (1979, 52) explains: "The radical change in the Maroons' existence brought about by the treaties [with the British] marked a new beginning for their societies, and the Maroons came to see the treaties as marking their origin, rather than their rebirth." While they do not deny their African heritage, the people of Accompong take greater pride in being Maroons and strongly challenge any institution or individual that denies their right to sovereignty.

Because the music event encompasses so many aspects of a music culture, several scholars have used it as the object of study. J. H. Kwabena Nketia (1990, 79) argues that an examination of the music event provides "a richer and more dynamic view of a music culture than other approaches that do not integrate contextual considerations in the analysis." For Marcia Herndon (1971, 340), the musical occasion "may be regarded as an encapsulated expression of the shared cognitive forms and values of a society, which includes not only the music itself but also the totality of associated behavior and underlying concepts. It is usually a named event, with a beginning and an end, varying degrees of organization of activity, audience/performances, and location." Ruth Stone (1982, 136) believes that "the event is more than a reflection of something else: it is a processual creation within a finite sphere of reality." According to Martin Stokes (1994, 3), "The musical event ... evokes and organises collective memories and present experiences of place with an intensity, power and simplicity unmatched by any other social activity." The January Sixth celebration represents some of what these scholars have indicated, but it also has deeper meanings. For the Accompong Maroons, the event is not only a reminder and signifier of their collective identity, it is one of the few occasions in their culture when music, history, religion, politics, and economics intersect to create an experience in which all are free and proud to actualize their heritage. As Victor Turner (1982, 16) puts it, "When a social group, whether it be a family, clan, village, nation, congregation, or church, celebrates a particular event or occasion, such as birth, harvest, or national independence, it also `celebrates itself.' In other words, it attempts to manifest, in symbolic form, what it conceives to be its essential life."

To understand better the significance of the January Sixth celebration and how various cultural elements are integrated to give meaning to the event, a general discussion of Accompong Maroon history and music culture (song, instruments, music and dance, performers) is critical. Because much emphasis is placed on the separate activities of men and women at the celebration, an examination of gender issues is also necessary. Not only will this information provide a holistic view of the Maroons and their expressive culture, it will help to inform the analysis of the sound, movement, and other aspects of performance practices associated with the event.

Cultural History

Although the Spaniards settled in Jamaica in 1509, they did not begin to transport Africans to the island until 1517. The initial handful of Africans served as body servants, while the indigenous Arawak Indians worked on ranches and in the fields and mines. However, as the Arawak diminished in numbers because of disease and suicide, the Spaniards imported more Africans. From the sixteenth to the mid-seventeenth century, most Africans transported to Jamaica were from Senegambia (Curtin 1969, 95-126). When the English invaded Jamaica in 1655, many Spaniards left without a struggle; however, a hard core remained and decided to fight to regain the island (Robinson 1969, 16). Although a few Africans remained loyal to the Spaniards, the vast majority quickly set up their own camps in the hills (Patterson 1979, 253). The years of fighting for the Spaniards served as training for the future Maroon warriors.

Even though the English were not able to contain the Maroons after the war, this did not discourage Europeans from settling on the island and establishing Jamaica as a British colony. In 1668, when sugar became one of the foremost commodities, the English began importing large numbers of Africans to work on the sugar estates. They came from many areas of West Africa, from Senegambia to Congo-Angola and Madagascar. Included were Akan speakers from the Gold Coast (present-day Ghana) known as Coromantees,(5) whose language is preserved in "Kromanti' songs performed in the January Sixth celebration.

During the 1720s, two main groups of African rebels existed: the Leeward Maroons, found in areas near the center of the island, and the more numerous Windward Maroons, descendants of Africans who had been involved in the Spanish resistance of the 1650s and lived in the hills between the northern and southeastern parts of the island. Each group was well organized and divided into several settlements centered on a main town or village. The Leewards, comprising escaped slaves who had participated in one or more plantation revolts of the late seventeenth century,(6) elected a leader called Kojo sometime in the early eighteenth century. On assuming command, he appointed his two brothers, Accompong and Johnny,(7) as captains under him (Robinson 1969, 33; Campbell 1988, 46). Scholars are not certain about Kojo's place and date of birth. Most sources indicate that he was born in Jamaica, and Jamaican oral tradition has him the son of a prince, Naquan, who was transported from the Gold Coast to Jamaica by the Spaniards during the mid-seventeenth century (McFarlane 1977, 18-19). In describing the attributes of Kojo and his group, Elain White (1973, 302) states: "Cudjoe ... was a natural born leader of great courage and high morale, with the ability to organize and inspire. He was of medium size and heavy build, with wide shoulders. He and his men possessed the amazing ability to run, or roll, through their various firings and evolutions."

In the 1730s, faced with ever-increasing numbers of escaped slaves willing to fight for their freedom, the British and their allies developed new strategies to destroy the Maroons. Military posts were built in the east near the Windward Maroons as well as in the central part of the island near Kojo's main camp. When Kojo learned of the destruction of important towns among the Windwards, he decided to move west and establish another camp for his group. The Leeward Maroons set up two major settlements in the western interior of the island: Cudjoe's Town (later renamed Trelawny Town after Edward Trelawny, the governor of Jamaica), northwest of the cockpits, and Accompong Town, named after Kojo's brother Accompong, to the southwest (Kopytoff 1976b, 88, 90).

The struggle between the Maroons and the British settlers dragged on for several years, as more and more Africans left the plantations to join the Maroon fighters or set up their own guerrilla groups. Both sides suffered great losses. In February 1739, Governor Trelawny ordered John Guthrie of the militia and Francis Sadler of the regular army to negotiate with Kojo for an end to the war. The British signed treaties with the Leeward and Windward Maroons on March 1 and June 23, 1739, respectively (Robinson 1969, 50-51; Wright 1970; Patterson 1979, 272-273). When the treaties were signed, five Maroon towns existed: Trelawny Town and Accompong Town in the west; and Scott's Hall, Charles Town, and Moore Town in the east (White 1973, 305). The Accompong Maroons consider the treaty signing a centrally important event in their history; it gives meaning to the January Sixth celebration.(8) However, scholars all agree that they were really one-sided documents. Not only did the treaties place the Maroons under the jurisdiction of Europeans and give them little they did not already have, but they provided the Europeans with a well-trained army to maintain the iron control necessary in a slave society (Robinson 1969, 52).

The influence of Europeans was significant after the signing of the treaties. Not only did Maroons assist the British in tracking down escaped slaves, but white superintendents who resided in each town supervised the administration of Maroon settlements. The eighteenth century also witnessed a weakening of social control in Maroon communities, an increase in factionalism, and the splitting up of a number of villages (Kopytoff 1973; Kopytoff 1978, 306-307; Price 1979, 228). Conflicts between the Maroons and Europeans continued. One of the most serious occurred in 1795, escalating into a war that led to the forced deportation of the Trelawny Maroons to Nova Scotia and then to Sierra Leone in 1800 (see discussion in "The Maroons" 1962; Furness 1965; Robinson 1969, 152-153; White 1973, 310-311; Price 1979, 227; Campbell 1988, 209-249).

As more and more people were born Maroons, not slaves, the groups developed a greater homogeneity, and the identification with various African or Creole groups was replaced by a Maroon identity with its own special African heritage and unique position in Jamaica (Kopytoff 1976b, 101). Maroon societies were not only transformed by the treaties, but the documents, with all their shortcomings, provided them with a new sense of self. While many scholars believe the treaties had a decaying effect on the life and culture of an independent people, the Maroons interpret them differently. Many still take great pride in the treaty signing because it symbolizes their victorious battles over the British. Furthermore, it memorializes "the first known successful slave rebellion, anticipating that of Toussaint L'Ouverture's in Haiti by some 60 years.... And from the point of view of guerrilla warfare, the Maroons with their brilliant tactics and strategems waged the first successful guerrilla warfare in the New World" (Campbell 1973, 48).

Of all the Maroon settlements, Accompong was the one most influenced by Western culture. Dalby (1971, 35) suggests that Accompong's proximity to the holiday center of Montego Bay, causing it to be billed as a tourist attraction, was a big factor in the amount of change and loss of tradition that took place. In addition, the early influence of the Christian church may have encouraged Accompong's appropriation of European elements (see discussion below). The strong survival of Maroon traditions at Moore Town and Scott's Hall were due to other reasons. In the case of Moore Town, the principal factors were the large size of the community and its relative isolation in the heart of the Blue Mountains. The small size of Scott's Hall and its position near the main highway from Kingston gave rise to a fierce determination among its inhabitants to preserve their identity as Maroons (Dalby 1971, 35-36).

While Kromanti may have been the general language among some Maroons in the early and mid-eighteenth century, by 1800 when most of the African-born Maroons were already dead, the predominant language was Jamaican Creole English, a mixture of English and various African languages. In modern times, only older people remember words in Kromanti (36-37). Dalby believes that the retention of vocabulary and phrases among the elderly may be attributed to two factors: the need to maintain a sense of "ethnic" allegiance and unity among the Maroon communities and the need for a concealed "code" to transmit warnings and messages within earshot of the "enemy" or potential enemy, that is, non-Maroons, both black and white (46-47). Campbell (1973, 53) gives a similar explanation for the maintenance of the language among older adults:

   The elders of ... communities have traditionally kept the language away
   from the younger ones, lest they divulge certain secrets to others. This is
   understandable when one recalls that the secret of Maroon success against
   the British ... was secrecy. The secrecy is not only attached to the
   language but also to some of the strategems and tactics used against the
   enemy.

In modern times, Jamaican Maroon communities share a similar political structure. Each community has a colonel as the executive head or leader. Below him is a set of officials whose names and functions differ from community to community. When Accompong had its election for colonel in 1982, the first in fifteen years, the two candidates were supported or opposed on the basis of their national party affiliations. Harris N. Cawley, the winner, was considered a supporter of Michael Manley's People's National Party, and his opponent, the incumbent Martin Luther Wright, a Jamaica Labor Party follower of Edward Seaga (McIver 1984, 26-27).

Born in 1939, Cawley is a native of Accompong. His father, Thomas James Cawley, was born in Accompong and served as colonel for a short time during the 1930s and 1950s; his mother, Bernetta Morris Cawley, was not a Maroon. She was born in the parish of St. James and did not move to Accompong until her marriage in 1935 (McIver 1984, 60-62; Dunham 1946, 109-110). Before 1986, most of Harris Cawley's life had been spent in Accompong, but he had visited the United States and lived in other parts of Jamaica when he attended school. Most of his academic training was obtained from a teachers college, but he also attended Jamaica's Bible College for four years. During my visit in 1986, Cawley was married to Naomi Thompson and they had one child. In addition to serving as colonel and teaching in the local primary school, Cawley sometimes preaches in churches in Accompong and neighboring districts (Cawley 1986).

Similar to African-derived groups in other parts of the diaspora, religion is central in the lives of the Maroons. Through possession, which is often induced by music making and dancing, people communicate with and assume the attributes of spirits and deities (Herskovits 1970, 251-217; Nketia 1957; Brathwaite 1971, 219-220; DjeDje 1984; Rouget 1985). Myalism is regarded as the first religious organization to be formed among Africans in Jamaica (Alleyne 1988, 85). Not only did religious practices associated with myal and obeah(9) give Maroons the confidence to make war on the British, but these beliefs are assumed to have supported Maroon values and goals and promoted social solidarity. Many scholars discuss the two religious practices, myalism and obeah, interchangeably, but subtle differences do exist. Garth White's discussion is important for helping one to understand the historical significance of the religion and why myal is practiced at the January Sixth celebration:

   Myalists were initially "du-good" (do-good) people, inspired to keep alive
   the links with ancestral spirits and to fight against evil. In furtherance
   of this aim, they were pitted not only against the whites, but also against
   the obeahman, the practitioner of sorcery and witchcraft. Both myal and
   obeah were steeped in African lore and passed on aspects of the African
   tradition to successor groups. Ideally distinct from one another, they drew
   their "power" from similar sources and there were instances when the two
   fused, a fact which lead [sic] many historians to use the terms
   interchangeably. The myalists were however, primarily concerned with
   healing and countering the effects of destructive sorcery.

   Because they could not openly practise their calling and were without the
   institutional support they had known in Africa, the myalists and obeahmen
   made use of both secular and religious occasions to perform their rituals.
   Thus the term "myal" came to be used to refer to a group, a dance, the
   state of possession (a trance-like state when communication with the
   ancestral spirits was made possible) and even to a herb called "myal-weed"
   used by these "spiritualists." Long [1774, 2:416], an early observer, noted
   that "some of these execrable wretches in Jamaica introduced what they
   called the myal dance and established a kind of society, in which they
   invited all they could." In conditions of traumatic physical and psychic
   shock, the slaves had rebuilt their belief system adapting it to their new
   conditions.

   The music, dance and ritual of the myal dance induced possession. Early
   reports written by Europeans who had stealthily observed these activities
   mention "wild" dances and "noisy" music. The main instruments were drums,
   one type of which was called the gumbe, and another the bon, and calabash
   shakas. Myalism became so powerful, in itself, and as an effective medium
   to coordinate slave revolt, that the authorities made its practice
   punishable by death. Thus suppressed, the myal movement went further
   underground but never disappeared totally. It provided elements which were
   incorporated by other groups and resurfaced from time to time, notably just
   after Emancipation and during the Great Revival which swept the island in
   the 1860s. (White 1982, 47-48)

Unlike Maroons in the eastern part of the island, who maintained African religious practices, only fragments of traditional religion can be found today among Accompong Maroons, because Accompong officials made great efforts to stamp out anything associated with traditional culture and Africa after the signing of the treaties (see Bilby 1979; Bilby 1981b; Hall-Alleyne 1982, 19-22; McIver 1984, 32; Dunham 1946, 56, 68). Although African practices may not be as pronounced as in other parts of the island, religion continues to be important to Accompong Maroons. Harris N. Cawley, who was serving as an elder of the United Church in Accompong when I interviewed him in 1986, has interesting insights on the development of religion in Accompong. While his discussion is lengthy, it is helpful in understanding the belief system of those who participate in the January Sixth celebration:

   It [religion] goes back a long way. I have been trying to find out some
   time ago when was the first [Christian] church instituted here. But what I
   actually discovered is that the Maroons came with their own religion. They
   came with a certain form of religion from Africa. After that, the Maroons
   were in certain relationships with the Jamaican government and the British
   who was then in the island. And as the Maroons had such a good relationship
   between the two parties after the war and peace treaty was signed, the
   British decided to send people to live among the Maroons, who were not
   missionaries at the first. There were people [who] came to stay with the
   Maroons to see to it that they were abiding by the terms of the treaty, and
   that there would not be an outbreak of a war again. So from that angle,
   missionaries got the opportunity because those people [who] lived here who
   were foreigners found that it was possible for other people to come along
   and to stay among the Maroons. So missionaries start to come along in the
   latter half of the eighteenth century....

   But the Maroons had another form of African religion. And I think we still
   have some traces of it around, where the head is wrapped, and the drums are
   used as a part of the music, and they do different things, in the respect
   of their own understanding of nature, of the spirits, and so forth. There
   is just one god that they worship, Jehovah. In that kind of church [Zion
   Church], they like to fly a lot of flags, primarily red flags. And they
   would put up poles with certain things on it to welcome the spirits. At a
   certain time, they would burn a lot of candles and have a special ceremony.
   They even do a form of healing by applying different kinds of water that is
   prayed for; beating of the drums, chanting of certain songs, and these
   things would take care of the illness of that particular person.

   They generally use the same cylindrical drums that we have, [but] not the
   gumbe. The gumbe is primarily used for the Maroon special festival. It is
   not used for any of the church services. They call them rattle drums,
   generally three. You have a bass drum and two rattle drums. Generally men
   play these drums. Women can play too, but generally speaking, men do most
   of the music as far as where the Maroon culture is concerned. The playing
   of the drum and the singing, those are the general activities that take
   place.

   They have their dance, and sometime one form of a dance is called trooping,
   which is a kind of dance where everybody goes in one systematic rhythm at
   the same time. And that is followed by certain kind of chants, that will go
   on for an hour or late up in the night sometimes. And they would speak
   about the spirit, inviting a spirit in, and certain people would be induced
   with the spirit, and they would do curious things like running out and such
   the like. And even [at] their own Maroon festival too, sometimes in the
   days gone by, they used to do curious things....

   When the spirit come, they call that myalism. When the myal takes the
   individual, the individual would run out and go in the bushes if it is even
   dark and would break certain bushes. And if a person who is belonging to
   that group is sick or is on his sick bed, that person find him anywhere he
   is, and he will be beaten with that kind of a bush. And in many cases, the
   report was that they got well.

   Mostly women are the leaders of this ceremony. The part that the men take
   is to monitor the music, and the playing of the drums. But the women you
   always find is the leader in these churches in terms of singing. The men
   always play a second role in these kind of churches that I'm telling about,
   the Zion Church. People also refer to them as Pocomania, but it's a mixture
   of Christianity and African religions. They use the Bible as the authority.
   They preach, and even some of them baptize, and even some of them serve
   sacrament. But they do it their own way. They wear special kind of
   clothing. They wear a gown with their heads neatly and nicely wrapped [in]
   red and white.

Music and Dance

Singing is the most important medium of performance for the Accompong Maroons. Songs are generally learned and transmitted informally through imitation. Because singing is so central to music making, it is not surprising that most of the music research conducted on Maroons in Accompong has focused on songs.(10) Helen Roberts (1925; 1926) documented several songs that Accompong Maroon performers identified as "Koromanti," together with other songs of Jamaican origin, which the Maroons referred to as "Jamaican topical songs, comic or Jamal songs" (Roberts 1926, 344-346).(11)

In modern times, songs are performed at many occasions--at church, for recreation, for processing through the town on important occasions, and during holiday celebrations: for example, for Easter ("Were You There" or "Gethsamane"), for Christmas Day ("Hark the Herald Angels Sing"), for New Year's Eve or Watch Night ("Bright Morning Star, the Angels Want Come In" or "Take Up Your Gun and Fight for War"), and for New Year's Day ("Happy New Year" or "Give Us Another Year O Lord"). Some songs can be used in a variety of contexts. According to Advira Williams (1986a), who performed it for me, "I Would Write Him" is a marching song sometimes performed at processions on Christmas and New Year's Day (see Ex. 1). Not only is the song's text in standard English, but the melody and duple rhythm of "I Would Write Him" also show influences of European culture. The lyric--about writing a letter to a loved one--suggests that it might be related to a European ballad or folk song. Beckwith (1929, 205) indicates that it was not uncommon for English ballads to be transformed into Jamaican songs, a process she explains in the following:

   It is certain then, that among the negro folk of Jamaica, the continuous
   narrative song of the old English ballad has either been extended into the
   part prose, part song rendering of an "Anansi" story proper, or been
   condensed into the elliptical form of the Jamaica lyric song. And in so
   doing it has merely followed the fate of all foreign material which is
   taken into and made a part of a living folk art; it has been adapted to the
   style of art of which it has become a part. For consecutive story told  in
   song is ... quite foreign to West Africa art.(12) It certainly is to that
   of the Jamaica negro, whose art of song depends rather upon the repetition
   of a few phrases rearranged to suit the individual tune or taste and
   expressing the thought in elliptical fashion, this repetition taking the
   place of rhyme to hold the whole together. (Beckwith 1924, 457-458)

[Example 1 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

A large repertoire of songs is performed specifically for January Sixth (see Appendix). The songs are learned and transmitted from one generation to another as young and old perform them annually. When I asked Advira Williams (1986a) how she learned the January Sixth songs, she stated, "I went to Parade Ground on the sixth of January. I went over there to the celebration. We all sang, and I catch the song when we all were singing. We dance around."

While the tunes and melodies of songs are preserved through oral transmission, the literal meanings of song texts are lost. Like much oral literature, songs have become a part of community life without individuals understanding their significance (Hall-Alleyne 1984, 33). An example is the song "Poor Ramsey":

   Cow los' oh dem sey a me ay,
   Mi gu wey yah fe sake a dem oh,
   Mi gu wey yah fe sake a dem oh,
   Mi gu wey yah fe sake a dem oh,
   Buddy oh se see den country tun dung pan poor Ramsey ay.
   Mule los oh dem sey a me ay,
   Cow los' oh dem sey a me ay,
   Goat los' dem sey a me ay,
   Buddy oh so see dem country tun dung pan poor Ramsey ay.

Williams (1986b) stated: "The older ones, the ones like me dad, they don't explain and tell us the meaning of singing those songs. So we don't directly know the meaning."(13) She and her friend Sylvia Salmon (Accompong's minister of health and secretary of the culture group in 1986) agreed that older people had been remiss in not passing on information to the younger generation. However, James Anderson (1986b), who was present when I discussed the matter with his daughter, simply stated, "Some of the young people don't know it. No, no, no. They can't know all of it." It is not known if this relates to the Maroons' desire to keep traditions secret, as was done in the past, or if it is simply evidence of the gap that often forms between generations. It should be noted, however, that in my interview with Anderson, he stated, "We are not to do everything. We have a little secret you know." In an indirect way, he explained that it was not appropriate for him to tell me (and possibly others) details about the meanings of songs.

Songs are performed in standard English or Jamaican Creole; "Poor Ramsey" is in Creole. Martin Luther Wright (1986) explained to me, "The language of many of the songs is mixed. In the old day they [Maroons] sing it in African, but we doesn't do it in African, because a lot of the African songs and language has died out now. But if you go over to Moore Town and Scott's Hall, their [African] language is fluently spoken. But in Accompong, they just remember a few of these songs."

Only grave-digging songs, which Wright referred to as "Kromanti songs," are performed in the African language (see Appendix). The literal meanings of Kromanti songs have been lost, and only a few are remembered. In the article "Possible Survivals of African Song in Jamaica," Helen Roberts (1926) identifies at least seven of the ten songs in her analysis as Koromanti. However, some men in Accompong in 1986 indicated that they could remember only one or two: the song performed when men dig the grave and the song sung when they leave the graveyard (Miles 1986; M. L. Wright 1986).(14) Besides being sung at the grave-side, Kromanti songs were performed in other contexts in earlier times. In the account of her visit to Accompong in the 1930s, Zora Neale Hurston (1990, 33-37) explains that "Karamanti" songs were sung during a hunt for a hog, when they killed and cooked the hog, and when they marched back to town after eating the hog. In his discussion of Accompong Kromanti songs, Bilby (1981a, 10) states:

   In Accompong ... Kromanti songs have a very different function than in the
   other Maroon communities. They are not performed in the context of
   ceremonial dance (although it is possible they once were), and they are not
   sung for the purpose of invoking spirits to come and possess the living.

   The Kromanti songs of Accompong are associated primarily with gravedigging
   and burial. When a grave is being made for a deceased Maroon, it is
   customary for the gravediggers to stop working at some point, pour
   libations over it, and sing a number of Kromanti songs. This ceremony is
   essential to the proper preparation of a grave. It is meant to honor the
   departed, and to hasten the reunion of his or her spirit with the other
   Maroon ancestors.

   Since Kromanti songs have such a specific function, they are not known very
   well by members of the community at large; the gravediggers of Accompong
   are the primary keepers of the tradition. But it should be noted that the
   Kromanti songs are also sung by the wider community once a year during the
   January celebrations in honor of Kojo (Cudjoe).... It is said that at this
   time the songs are sung over the grave of Kojo ... in a ceremony which has
   traditionally been closed to the public.

Although present-day Maroons recognize the importance of maintaining older traditions, in earlier years some Accompong Maroons prided themselves on being Western. The few features retained from African or early Maroon culture were kept secret from outsiders. On the one hand, secrecy was important to their survival, but in some instances secrecy reflected their shame in being considered inferior or backward by non-Maroons. Also, because the Maroons were independent and not easy to exploit, some outsiders regarded them as suspicious and unapproachable (Dunham 1946, 82-83).

In many cultures whose identity is closely associated with Africa, music and dancing are integrated as one. In performance, it is rare for one to occur without the other. Among the Maroons, the situation is no different.(15) Dunham's comments are insightful: "What they lack in material art, the Maroons make ample compensation for in their nonmaterial art which is composed of `nonsense' and `Nansi' stories, Koromantee songs and dances, and a love for and skill in the dance in general" (1946, 44).

One dance associated with January Sixth is called ambush. A mimed war dance, it reenacts the Maroons' encounter with the enemy. The dancer is camouflaged in leaves, and the steps are thought to be reflective of the gestures of war (Hall-Alleyne 1982, 22, 27; Dunham 1946, 135-136). At the 1986 celebration, green leaves were used as symbols for war, but dancers employed them in different ways. Olivia Sylvia Rowe (1986) explains: "We dance with green bush. Them call myal reed. We got it out here from the field and we use it. Sometime we take it and put it around us. Sometime we put it around our neck like a earring [necklace]. Then sometime we put it around we [our] head. Sometime we'd have it around we waist, all kind of little different thing." The dance associated with myal spirit possession is performed on January Sixth, and it is also performed during a crisis period such as a funeral or to seek information from ancestors about the identity of a wrongdoer. When the spirit of an ancestor takes possession of the dancer's body, the dancer loses control of speech and other faculties and is enveloped by the spirit of the ancestor. McFarlane (1977, 28) states:

   The Maroons did ... put a strong emphasis on the power of the dead. It was
   an unquestioned belief that all good people after death selected some
   individual with whom to communicate advice and warnings. For instance, at a
   Koromanteen dance, it was not unusual for a long departed relative to
   "ride" one of the dancers and relay important messages and suggestions.

In modern times, women who practice myal do not receive payment for their work but regard it as a special gift that enables them to converse with the ancestors and to have visions that predict future events (McIver 1984, 36). "At the 1974 celebration two women were reported to have rolled on the ground, danced and chanted, and eaten fire from lighted match sticks while possessed by ancestor spirits" (37). According to M. L. Wright (1986), people do not decide "to do myal, it just happens to them." When I asked why it happens to some people and not to others, he stated, "I just don't know. But I've seen it. I have witnessed this myself." His description of what occurs when someone experiences myal on January Sixth is noteworthy:

   Well, I'm not so fluent in it. But when I was a child, when they start the
   dancing, a lot of people get myal. The spirits took hold of them. The
   colonel or his near officers, when the person lies there, he has to go and
   wipe his sweat and that cools him down. When the person lies there, he's
   actually unconscious. So you must either get some rum and rub him up, or
   get his sweat and rub him over. And he gets relief from that. And some
   people will climb the trees and throw themselves down [on the pingwing, a
   prickly plant], and not a prickle pierce them. It's at the height of myal
   causing that. Men and women both [experience it] during the time of the
   official ceremony. That's the spirit of the dead [that] walks with them.

At the January Sixth celebration in 1986, women more than men seemed to be affected by myalism. Two women, Vita Baker and Madge Wright, became so agitated that they fell to the ground, and Baker even ran into the bushes. Valerie Wright, Accompong's cultural officer in 1986, held a small cup containing rum in one of her hands. As people went into trance, she leaned them against her body and rubbed their faces with rum. To prevent the myal from "taking her," Olive Sylvia Rowe, the song leader at the January Sixth celebration, held a box of matches in one of her hands. "When I was singing and the myal take me, I go down on the ground and I sit there for while," she explained later. "You see me with a box of matches in my hand? I just arms up that myal [I just hold my arms up to that myal and say], don't take me" (Rowe 1986).

Although anyone can experience myal, Rowe's comments also suggest that women, who primarily comprise Accompong's culture group, are most affected by trance:(16)

   Sometime we cut away in the myal, and sometime we come back. When you see
   the girl rolling over, upon the grass there, [s]he laid a way in the myal,
   the myal dance. Well, we's a myal set of people, the culture group. The
   Kojo group, those are the people they fight with ambush. When he am gone,
   we don't know Kojo. We don't know nothing about those people [early
   Maroons]. But we come and we adopt the principle about those things. So in
   all those things we just take a little way with those things. Some say we
   will get killed by that, by talking out [about] the Maroon history. So we
   just keep quiet, you see. We don't know what might happen to our life. You
   can get killed, you can just come back normal. (Rowe 1986)

Although a wide variety of instruments have been used for music making in Accompong, percussion instruments predominate at the January Sixth celebration. Many of the instruments are similar to those employed by groups in other parts of Jamaica and the West Indies. Accompong Maroons' introduction to European instruments occurred early in their history. The diaries of British soldiers present at some of the meetings between Maroon and British leaders provide interesting data on the behavior of both groups when contact was made:

   Sunday, 18th [February 1731 (?)] ... we eard them in three ... bodies, some
   blowing their horns, and some singing.... In some little time, they began
   to talk to us and we to them.... Captain Cudjoe and Captain Cuffee came
   down.... Colonel Guthrie and Captain Sadler met them there, and had a long
   conference with them.... They were very much pleased with our music, and
   several of them danced.

   Wednesday 21st. Two negroes came up to us, and told us that Capt. Cudjoe
   was in the open ground with some of his people, and desired that we would
   come to him; for he would not come to us, on account he had no room in the
   woods to dance.... Col. Guthrie, Captain Sadler and 10 other gentlemen,
   went down.... We carried our drum, French horn and bagpipes. They received
   us seemingly with a great deal of joy; they sounded their horn, we beat the
   drum and sounded our French horn; gave them some tunes with the bagpipe,
   which they seemed pleased with. (Quoted in Mullin 1992, 50-51)

Dunham (1946, 22-24, 98, 110) makes several references to the fiddle, which was used primarily to accompany "set" and quadrille dancing as well as for entertainment at social occasions such as feasts and weddings. In addition, she comments briefly on the mouth organ, bamboo flute, guitar, gourd rattle (sometimes called shac-shac), abeng, and gumbe (also spelled gumbay, gombay, goombay, goombah, goombeh) (37, 53-56). Earl Leaf, who visited Accompong in the 1940s, observed musicians who played banjos, mandolins, ukuleles, and reed flutes. The orchestra used to accompany dancing--quadrilles, polkas, waltzes, and square or "set" dances--was composed of guitar, bamboo-reed flute, banjo, and rumba box ("a wooden box with three metal prongs bracketted to one side," which the musician slaps, raps, and kicks, "causing three rhythmic beats and a vibrating sound of the prongs" [Leaf 1948, 70]). According to Valerie Wright (1986), the saxophone and other instruments associated with traditional and colonial culture are no longer performed in modern times because "the younger people prefer to listen to the fast music. As the age goes, a certain kind of timing in music steps out."

Some drums played in the January Sixth celebration in Accompong are similar to those used in other contexts. According to Bilby (1981a, 11) "the instruments ... are essentially the same as those performed in the fife-and-drum (minus the fife) ensembles which accompany Jonkonnu dancing, and also in Revival churches in many parts of Jamaica: a large two-headed bass drum, and one or two smaller two-headed side drums, the former beaten with a padded stick and the latter played with a pair of wooden sticks" (see Fig. 1). Among Accompong Maroons, the side drum is referred to as the "rattle," "round," or "circular" drum. A few people refer to the bass and side drums as "repeater" drums (Rowe 1986).

[Figure 1 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Two instruments with distinctive ceremonial roles are the abeng (a horn) and the gumbe (a small drum). Scholars and members of the Accompong community alike refer to the abeng and gumbe (also called bench drum) as "official instruments," primarily because they are African-derived and are the ones used in traditional ceremonies (Roberts 1924, 247-251; Hall-Alleyne 1982, 23; Cawley, 1980; Cawley, 1986; M. L. Wright 1986; V. Wright 1986). The word gumbe is believed to be derived from the Bantu word ngoma, a generic term for drum as well as other aspects of music making in central, eastern, and southern Africa. Abeng is an Akan term for the horn of an animal (Dalby 1971, 43; Clerk [1913] 1975, 67). Describing the gumbe that she saw in the 1920s, Roberts (1924, 247) states: "The gumbe is square and resembles a milking stool ... a little except that it has four legs, two of which, forming opposites, are shorter than the other pair" (see Fig. 2). George Sylvester Huggins (1986), one of the few gumbe makers in Accompong, states that the instrument may be constructed from Jamaica-grown cedar, pine, or mahogany. The inner part of the gumbe is called the baby, while the outer part is called the frame. The skin from a female goat is used for the membrane because it gives the drum a lighter sound. The gumbe's membrane "is tightened by means of wedges driven into the frame. This drum is played with the palms and fingers of both hands" (Bilby 1981a, 11). According to Huggins, the gumbe is constructed in three sizes--small, medium, and large--but only the large one is used as the official, or town drum. Cawley (1986) states that the small gumbe kept at the colonel's residence is "not the standard size. It is just made for show, for a souvenir. And we usually sell gumbe that is not made at the standard size; the smaller than the standard size, we give those as souvenirs. The [official] gumbe is kept by the cultural officer."

[Figure 2 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

In early years, the gumbe was associated with myalism, which was retained in its purest form among the gumbe dancers of St. Elizabeth (White 1982, 48). In her explanation of the religious significance of the gumbe, Beckwith (1929, 148-149) states: "As for the gombay, I think it is this instrument which is supposed to draw into itself the spirit or `death' of the myal dance.... Two of the three gombay drums I saw in St. Elizabeth were owned by Myal Men, and the third was in the possession of the Maroons.... Yet all gombays alike are played with the fingers with a peculiar rhythm of the myal songs, and seem to be related to the practice of obeah."

Although it is a wind instrument, the abeng (see Fig. 3) has a primarily non-musical function. Astley Clerk ([1913] 1975, 66) called the abeng the Maroons' national instrument and described it thus:

   It is made of eight or nine inches of the small end of the horn of the
   cow--sufficient of the tip is take [sic] off to leave  a hole about the
   size of a pea. On the concave side of the horn, and close to the smaller
   end, an oblong opening or mouth hole is made; this opening is about a
   quarter of an inch wide by about one inch long. This method of placing the
   mouth piece on the side, and not at the extremity, is obtained by the
   Maroons from the Africans, among whom, and in their native land, this
   construction is commonly used for instruments of the trumpet class--it is
   also an excellent illustration of how one people is influenced by another.
   To produce the sound the lips are placed to the oblong opening and the
   thumb then covers the hole in the tip, the opening and closing of which
   gives a variation of about a tone. The Maroons have a regular code of
   signals for the Abeng which is never divulged to any but their own people.

[Figure 3 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

In early Maroon history, the abeng was important during warfare. Campbell (1988, 48) explains:

   The abeng ... can be heard at a considerable distance. Its sound would
   immediately alert other Maroons. For they must listen. This instrument can
   utilize a wide range of notes; thus it was capable of transmitting
   complicated messages, intelligible only to the Maroons, informing them of
   the size of the approaching troops, the amount of armaments they possessed,
   the path they were using, and the like. Similarly, directions regarding
   Maroon strategies would be given on the abeng by their chief of operations.
   Once the alarm was sounded everyone knew what to do. Immediately, the
   soldiers would repair to their posts under their respective captains,
   almost always in a defensive position to ambush the unsuspecting enemy;
   simultaneously, the women and children, their clothes already packed, would
   fly to a prearranged rendezvous. Their African instrument, the abeng, was a
   source of terror to the enemies, in itself and by itself. The Maroons soon
   became aware that the British parties found its sound "hideous and
   terrible," and they exploited its use to the fullest extent, by blowing on
   it continuously when the parties were close to their towns, thus creating
   confusion and in some instances flight among the soldiers.

Although most Accompong Maroons no longer understand messages sounded on the abeng, the ability to play the instrument is highly regarded in Maroon culture. M. L. Wright (1986) states: "It's blown for a special purpose. It is blown to get people together, it is blown when a person dies. If a meeting is in progress, it is blown, the time when they approach. And when a person buried, it is blown.... We have one special one ... the official one that is in existence from the year 1663, the very year the war starts between the Maroons and the British."

As official instruments, the gumbe and abeng are stored and treated differently from other instruments. Cawley (1986) explains:

   The abeng is kept by the colonel sometimes, and it is kept by the major
   sometimes. Now that the festive season is on, it will be in much use. So
   the major keeps it. But when there is no function going on, the colonel
   would keep the abeng. And when there's a call or somebody dies, they would
   be coming to the colonel for the abeng. That person would be given the
   abeng, and he would take it to the abeng blower. And the abeng blower would
   go to where the dead one is, and he would sound the abeng. And everybody in
   the community would know that they hear the sound coming from that special
   home and Sister Jane or Nanny's dead. And that would warn everybody in the
   community. The cultural officer is not allowed to keep the abeng because
   she's a woman, and there are special things that the woman does not do
   during the festival.

In Accompong there is no set method for the recruitment and training of those who participate in music making. To be able to play an instrument is highly valued, but it is not a tradition that is necessarily inherited through kinship. M. L. Wright (1986) states: "It's a privilege to blow the abeng. But we doesn't keep people away, because it's not good for one person to blow. `Cause when they die by old age, or may die suddenly; there must be somebody to take his place. So it not good to have one person. As many people who wish to blow, they are privileged to it."

Some Accompong Maroons believe that individuals are chosen to become musicians through divine inspiration or spiritual intervention. Cawley (1986) gives evidence of this occurring in his lifetime:

   We had a man who served by the name Mr. Gilbert Rowe. He was one of the
   most outstanding abeng blowers for many years. And even before him we had a
   man by the name of George Gallier.(17) He was one of those men who had used
   the abeng for many decades until he died. After his death, this man
   [Gilbert Rowe] went to the funeral. They wanted somebody who will be able
   to sound the abeng. This man, either he was prompted by the spirit or
   somehow, but he took the abeng, and he started to blow the abeng. And it
   seems as if the natural gift of Mr. Gallier came to this man. And he blew
   the abeng for over forty-eight years. And he died.

   And there's another fellow who went to his funeral, and I was there too,
   and seems as if the spirit of this gift came to that fellow, too. And he
   took the abeng and he blew it, and everybody at that funeral said that they
   have never heard it sounded like that before, as if the spirit of this man
   had been transferred to this fellow. And he blew it sometime. But we have
   other people who are blowing it, but nobody blows it as good as that
   fellow.

Several performers in Accompong have been organized into a cultural group whose function is to perform and represent Accompong at special events within and outside the community (McIver 1984, 68; Rowe 1986). Cawley (1986) believes that having a cultural group is a way of maintaining a tradition that existed in earlier times:

   In the days of Kojo, they had their cultural group. I refer to it as a
   cultural group because it depicts a lot of the culture. But in those days
   gone by, they used to refer to them as the dancers. As the dancers, those
   people do the dance and the play.(18) They're called also a play, too,
   because there are different plays that they do during the dancing. But
   since of late now, we feel that we should give it up-to-date name. So we
   label it as a cultural group, which is understandable to most people. And
   the cultural group operates not only on Kindah day, as we call it, but
   they operate whenever they are called upon. You have that special group
   that wear their gowns, both men and women, and they put on their display
   and dance.

   And the cultural group has a mother [sometimes referred to as governess]
   who is a person who sings the songs. She must know most of the songs. Even
   though the cultural officer may not know all the songs, she [the mother] is
   the person who must be well versed in the songs. She's the [song] leader
   for the group. But she consults with the cultural officer. So the [song]
   leader is Mistress Ruby [Olive Sylvia] Rowe. It's not age [that determines
   who is to be the mother]. It's the person who is more flexible, versatile,
   understands how to do the thing with rituals, because you may be old and
   you may not be able to sing. So anybody who is chosen as a leader, you have
   to be a singer. And she has a good pitched voice, and she knows her role
   and so forth. So she has been chosen.

Gender

Clearly defined roles for men and women have existed in Maroon culture since early times. Most men were involved in hunting and warfare. Following African custom, most women planted crops (Campbell 1988, 47) and even cleared a new ground for gardening; men who were not skilled in warfare helped women to plant, but these men were not held in high esteem (Beckwith 1929, 190). However, a few women warriors are noted in Maroon history. The most celebrated of these, known as Nanny, fought against the British in the early eighteenth century. Although she did not displace the headmen in Nanny Town, the settlement that bore her name, it is she who is remembered. Maroons tell stories about her supernatural feats against whites, and she holds a position in Maroon oral tradition comparable to Kojo (Tuelon 1973; Dalby 1971, 48; Brathwaite 1977, 13-18; Kopytoff 1978, 300; McFarlane 1977, 28, 52, 119-121; Campbell 1988, 50-51).

In post-treaty times, gender roles did not drastically change. Women continued to bear the major responsibility for subsistence agriculture while men engaged in hunting and military activities. Thus, women's participation in agriculture, marketing, and trading is critical to the sustainment of Maroon economy, for female work activities help to support families and communities in the face of the unsteady work history of many males (Durant-Gonzalez 1983, 2, 11-12; McIver 1984, 20-21; Simmonds 1987, 32; M. L. Wright 1986).

Polygamy was accepted in earlier times, but wives had their own property. The husband lived with each wife two days in turn, leaving her free at other times to attend to her garden and carry produce to market (Beckwith 1929, 190-191). Because of her access to wealth, a Maroon woman was practically as independent as a Maroon man (Dunham 1946, 119). A form of polygamy was still practiced in the early twentieth century; although a man may have had only one wife, affairs with other women were common, and no stigma was attached to individuals involved in such relations.

Few women have been involved in Maroon politics. Although, in theory, leadership positions were open to both sexes, women were not elected or appointed to offices. Scott's Hall was the first town in Maroon history to appoint a woman to the post of major (Campbell 1973, 49-50). Accompong made history when Cawley won the election in 1982 and chose four women to be in his twelve-member cabinet. It is significant that a woman, Valerie Wright, was appointed as the officer for cultural affairs because this person is responsible for the image that the Maroons convey to the rest of the island. Instead of isolating themselves from the larger population, as was done in the past, most Maroons in modern times believe they must share their traditions and work to present their heritage in a positive way so that they can continue to develop and maintain a healthy relationship with the Jamaican government and people (McIver 1984, 67-68).

Since early history, Maroon women have been thought to have great spiritual powers. Nanny became legendary for the use of her powers in fighting the British (McIver 1984, 32-34). As noted in the foregoing, women continue to play a major role in religion. In traditional religious practices such as myalism, as well as in revivalist churches, women are the leaders.

In many ways, the gender roles of the Maroons in cultural performances is not very different from that found in Africa and other parts of the world (see DjeDje 1985, 85-86; Koskoff 1987, 4-14; Ziegler 1990, 90-92). At public events, women tend to sing and dance while men perform on instruments. Since instrumental performance rarely occurs without singing among the Accompong Maroons, both parts are needed for the whole. However, the Maroon situation is interesting because of the primary importance of song to the event and the fact that women always lead the singing. Thus, in terms of musical performance in the January Sixth celebration, the woman's role is commensurate with the male's. On this occasion, females are the leaders of the musical ensemble, even though they do not perform on the major musical instruments (abeng, gumbe, or other drums). According to Valerie Wright (1986), "The women really dance and sing. They can play the instruments but they are not allowed. We have a girl [in Accompong who] plays the bass drums. But she won't be playing it at Kindah. Another man will play. The men are chiefly the cooks. Besides cooking, they are in charge of all the preparation like cleaning the place, having it prepared, getting wood for the cooking, getting water, having everything ready." Gender is also a factor in the food eaten during the celebration. Female animals are never used for cooking because they are considered to be impure. According to M. L. Wright (1986), "you got to use pure animals, that's why they use all male animals. Even people who sell food at a lot of these stalls know that every animal that is killed must be a male animal. They doesn't use any female that day. A woman has certain periods."

The manner in which musical instruments are stored when they are not in use also reflects differences in gender. While the female cultural officer is not allowed to keep the abeng, she is responsible for the town's gumbe. This suggests that the abeng, a symbol of political authority, should remain in the hands of males, while the gumbe's association with religion allows it to be kept by a woman. Although few women played musical instruments in the past, this has changed in modern times. As the cultural group becomes more active and men are not available to attend rehearsals or participate in performances, a few women have decided to become drummers to accompany the singing. Alrena Wright (1986) states that she started playing the bass drum in 1983, around the time that the cultural group was formed. She chose the bass drum because it was easier to play than all the other instruments. As Valerie Wright indicated, she did not perform on January Sixth in 1986, but she did play that season during the processionals on Christmas and New Year's Day.

In summary, we see that whereas men dominate in the political world and women are the leaders in religion, men and women are equally involved in economics and music-making, although each sex performs different roles. Furthermore, Cawley's decision to include women in his cabinet, a political domain, symbolizes the changing gender roles in Accompong. Does this mean that compatibility will become the norm in politics, as it now is in economics? And will changes in political life be replicated in music performance? M. L. Wright's (1986) position on the issue is noteworthy: "Woman is accepted in every phase of life now. They have a great [and] major role. So it wouldn't matter to me at all. As a matter of fact, I would be glad to see a woman playing the abeng and playing the gumbe."

The Celebration

Most Accompong Maroons believe that the January Sixth celebration dates back to the time of Kojo, when he and members of his group celebrated after a victory in battle. According to oral tradition, "The Koromanteen dancers celebrated for weeks, as was the custom after a major battle. Every night the long-drums filled the mountains with buoyant and hilarious sounds. The women sang. People came from all over. ... Some danced, others just crowded around to watch" (McFarlane 1977, 103). Colonel Henry Augustus Rowe, who was appointed colonel of Accompong in 1920, confirmed that the celebration was in existence in the early 1900s, if not before:

   Accompong's Birthday was celebrated until 1930. It had become weighed down
   with Obeah practices and was consequently abolished. Where they originally
   lived was where the Birthday was celebrated but it was burnt down in 1930.
   Many people felt "great things would come out of it." Two men made too much
   out of it, practicing Obeah. The Officials felt that they were making too
   much. (Quoted in Williams 1938, 391)

However, Zora Neale Hurston's comments provide evidence that the celebration was still one of the few major events in the community when she visited Accompong during the mid-1930s:

   If I do not see a dance or a ceremony in its natural setting and sequence,
   I do not bother. Self-experience has taught me that those staged affairs
   are never the same as the real thing. I had been told by some of the
   Maroons that their big dance, and only real one, came on January 6th. That
   was when they went out to the wooded peaks the day before and came back
   with individual masques and costumes upon them. They are summoned from
   their night long retreat by the Abeng, or Conk-shell. Then there is a day
   of Afro-Karamante' dancing and singing, and feasting on jerked pork.
   (Hurston 1990, 23)

For present-day Maroons, the celebration is one of the most important events of the year. Not only is it important historically, but activities associated with the celebration help the community financially. Cawley (1986) explains the historical significance of the event:

   The celebration that we have was for the Maroons to celebrate the victory
   that they had in their war, struggles that lasted for over eighty-odd
   years.... It culminates also with Kojo's birthday. And it is also a
   celebration to mark the signing of the peace treaty, and the end of
   hostilities between both sides in the land. The celebration is also a
   reunification of the Maroon communities and families, because people leave
   the community and they go out. The celebration is to bring them back and to
   remind them of their noble heritage and their history that they should not
   forget.

   Some of the songs depict the history of the Maroons, the struggles they
   had, the victories that they had overcome, and the way in which they had
   carried on their lifestyle, and the holding of their African culture. We
   still continue with the blowing of the abeng, and the playing of the gumbe,
   and also other drums that were carried across from Africa. They even have
   one of the African songs that we need to have properly interpreted that
   they sing, even when they are digging graves and so forth.

Celebrations of this sort are not unique to Accompong. Maroons in other towns have similar events, but the Accompong Maroons believe that the ones in the east are not as successful. M. L. Wright (1986) explains: "I've gone to one in Moore Town ... and over to Scott's Hall. But their celebration had nothing to compare to Accompong celebration. Just a small group of people. Very little music. Well, they sing and dance, too. They know the African language over there fluently. They speaks it fluently."

Although the official celebration begins on January 6, members of the community prepare for the event on the night before by processing through the town, singing, dancing, and playing musical instruments. According to Bilby (1981a, 11), "The Maroons traditionally gather to dance and sing the old songs for themselves on the night before the celebration." During my visit in 1986, not only were the old songs performed, but the young people participated by playing their own music, such as reggae.

On the day of the event, the entire ambience of Accompong changes. In 1986, the most noticeable difference was the large number of visitors, including foreign tourists. Vendors selling food, crafts, clothes, etc., had set up stalls along the main thoroughfare, and several police were present to keep the peace.(19) It is only recently that visitors have been allowed to participate in the celebration. At one time it was reserved for the Maroons. Even in modern times, non-Maroons are not allowed to observe or participate in certain parts of the celebration. Cawley (1986) explains:

   Visitors take a great part in the whole celebration today, but in former
   days it was not so. It was just Maroon who had their celebration, but we
   thought it would be just selfish. Others must know about our history and
   our culture. And so visitors start to come in and start to take part. There
   are special ceremonies where visitors or strangers are not allowed to go,
   and that is kept as a part of their long-standing culture. It is my wish
   that in the days to come, we'll be able to have Maroons who will be
   celebrating also this day in the country wherever they are, in America or
   in the United Kingdom, with the blowing of the abeng, which is one of the
   outstanding symbols that we have here that is still carried on, and do
   something to work on behalf of the community here. That is one of my future
   plans, to set up programs of that nature.

On the day of the celebration, activities are held at locations that have particular historical significance: Kindah, approximately two miles from town; Old Town, about half a mile from Kindah; Parade Ground, one mile from the town center; and the Kojo Monument, in the center of town. According to Valerie Wright (1986), "Kindah means family. Under the shade [of the mango tree] was where Kojo and his men sat down to have conference. The English coming over the hill, they must know how to attack them; they must know what to do to stop them. So that spot there is really a conference spot." Old Town is important because Kojo's grave is located there. According to M. L. Wright (1986), "Old Town was where the Maroons first live. When the English was coming to invade Kojo, that was the village where they were coming at. But Kojo blocked them at the Peace Cave and kill them off before they could reach Old Town. In the treaty or history of Jamaica, it's referred to as Petty River Bottom." Parade Ground, the only expansive flat area in Accompong where a large number of people can be assembled, was the original ground where Kojo trained and drilled his men before they began an expedition (Cawley 1986). Since the 1930s, and possibly earlier, Parade Ground has been the primary site for community dances (Beckwith 1929, 195; Dunham 1946, 22, 110; Leaf 1948, 65-72). Kojo's Monument is a modern-day memorial completed in the early 1980s. For Cawley (1986), the monument is important for several reasons: "This is where wreaths may be laid on that day in honor of Kojo [and other heroes of] Accompong. You have Nanny, and you have a few more like Cuffee [Kofi] and Quaco [Kwaku]. These were outstanding Maroon leaders, or what we refer today as heroes of the Maroons. You may not hear much about these great heroes, but they have done a great deed."

Another important historical site is Peace Cave (also known as Ambush because the Maroons are believed to have ambushed the British there), although the main parts of the celebration do not take place there because of its great distance from the town. According to M. L. Wright (1986), "That's where he [Kojo] stopped the British, at Peace Cave. And from the Peace Cave to Old Town is approximately a mile. But on that day they doesn't go as far as Peace Cave; they go down to Kojo's grave to Old Town."

Activities associated with the celebration begin in the early morning hours of January 6, but the public does not become involved until midday. M. L. Wright (1986) provides an excellent synopsis of the events of the day. In 1986, I personally observed much of what he describes:

   First the official function starts precisely around ten o'clock in the
   morning. And that takes place at [a] place called Kindah.... Well, for the
   preparation for the feast, we buy a male pig. And we get yellow yam that
   [is] fit [i.e., ripe enough] to be roasted. And we get fit plantains and we
   get one or two roosters. We doesn't use any female animal for the
   celebration on that day.... We doesn't allow female to cook either for the
   official celebration. While the food is being looked after, they plays
   music right there, a gumbe, the abeng, and some round drums,(20) and the
   people dance underneath a big mango tree. The cooking area is located about
   twenty feet away from the mango tree.

   Around one P.M., when the food is cooked, some of the colonel's officers in
   the Kojo Council take a little down to Old Town. One of the gentlemen
   carries a pot on top of his head. There can be about a dozen or more, not
   all the officers. You can go at the Kojo's grave any other day, but they
   doesn't allow strangers on that day. They use performance there, and after
   they have finished, they come back up and join the Kindah crowd. While the
   officers are at Old Town, the singers and musicians dance for a certain
   period and some of the dancers go into trance. The officers arrive from
   Kindah about two-thirty P.M. with the abeng blower and a stick dancer
   leading them. Many of the people from Kindah go to join the officers as
   they walk back to Kindah. After the officers return, the food is given to
   everyone. Because the food is supposed to bring good luck for the New Year,
   many people are anxious to eat it. By the time the feasting ends, more
   people go into trance. Led by the abeng blower, colonel, officers,
   musicians, and dancers, then they start marching from Kindah to Parade
   Ground. As the processional moves through town, one of the marchers holds a
   large, black, opened umbrella high in the air and shakes it.(21) And they
   stop at certain spots on the way. When they reach Parade Ground, [there is]
   trooping and dancing. When I was colonel, they always visit my home. So now
   they go to Colonel Cawley's home, and that continues until three or four
   o'clock. And after that is finished, they goes to [Kojo's] Monument. And
   there they make speeches, as he [the colonel] tell them what [it] is all
   about and such things. Well, after that has gone through, the official part
   is over. Then the night music starts now. And you can have more people come
   in night than in the day, because those who work in the day always join in
   the night.

For most Accompong Maroons, the January Sixth celebration is a ritual that embodies Maroon culture. Thus, few changes have occurred over the years. M. L. Wright (1986) believes that the Maroons would resist change if it was proposed: "If you tell a Maroon that [change is coming], they will get at you. He doesn't want to change, it's a matter we want to improve on it." When asked about the types of improvements he would like to see, Wright continued, "I think we should have more play. We should have the language. That's what people want. People come to hear everything, the African language and more African songs. If the Maroons here and the Maroons throughout the world come back and put in and put everything together, that would work." Valerie Wright (1986) would like to improve the physical grounds: "We have a field down there where soldiers fought and all those graves, we need to mark them properly. At Peace Cave, we want to have some sort of a botanical garden so that when visitors come they can go and have a look at the area and pay a small fee so that it will help the community."(22)

The 1986 celebration "was significant because the Accompong Maroons held their first three-day (January 5-7) Reunification Conference, which brought together Maroons and distinguished visitors from around the world to meet and discuss various issues relating to Maroon communities in Jamaica" ("Team Conducts" 1986; see also Birhan 1985; Birhan, n.d.; "International Maroon" 1985).(23) Valerie Wright (1986) states, "Since people don't know anything about it [Maroon history], and we need for other people in other parts of the world to really understand more about our history, we need to be exposed a little more. So we thought of having a conference and invite other people who we believe can publicize this."

Analysis of the Celebration

In 1986, the music and dancing at Kindah were performed by a core group of performers. Initially, six to eight women did most of the singing and dancing. Occasionally one of them also played the rattle. The women all wore casual everyday clothes (a skirt and blouse or a dress). Most had scarves on their heads, as they normally do on workdays, though a few were bareheaded. As the women sang, they also danced, taking short steps in place, moving their bodies from side to side, and lightly swaying their arms along their sides. Each time they moved, they also slightly bent their bodies. Women controlled much of the performance at the celebration. Olive Sylvia Rowe (also known as Miss Ruby), who served as the governess or song leader, decided on the songs that should be performed and the length of time a song might be sung. However, any woman could take over the lead and start a song if she desired. About thirty to forty-five minutes into the performance, some women began to experience royal; as their side-to-side movements became more agitated, they took up more space. Sometimes they bent the top part of their bodies forward from the waist as they danced. Instead of keeping their arms close to their sides, they moved them more freely and higher into the air.

Four men played drums: there were two round drummers, one bass drummer, and one gumbe drummer. While the gumbe player sat on the ground, the other drummers stood near him and faced each other as they performed. Like the women, the men wore casual, everyday clothes (long pants and shirts). Most had on caps, but a few were bareheaded. One man wore a tightly rolled red scarf around his head as a headband. As the men performed, they also moved to the rhythm of the music, slightly bending and swaying their bodies back and forth. The men performed repetitive rhythmic patterns as instrumental accompaniment to the singing. The rhythm rarely varied from song to song, but the tempo changed. The drummers took their cue for the tempo from the song leader.

One abeng blower performed throughout the day. In addition to leading all of the processions--to and from Old Town and from Kindah to the Kojo Monument--he participated in the activities at Kindah by intermittently blowing the abeng. Although he stood most of the time, he did not dance or move when he joined the other performers at Kindah; rather, his demeanor was more calm and restrained than the others'.

The performance space at Kindah was very tight and compact. The core performers were surrounded by a larger group of spectators. With little distance between performers and audience, both groups moved and changed roles whenever they desired. When the music and dancing began, around noon, many in the audience were not actively involved in the performance. Rather, some quietly sat and watched the activities while others casually walked around the edges of the performance space. Many of the tourists took photographs. A few sang and moved a little to the music, and one Maroon man dressed in a Western suit was actively involved in the dancing. Throughout the performance, he held a bottle of rum in one of his hands, occasionally poured the rum into the other hand, and threw sprinkles of it into the air over the performance space. By the time the officials returned from Old Town, more people had become involved, dancing and singing songs. And young adults began to enter the center of the performance space and participate. The people who returned with the officials had long sticks and green bushes in their hands, symbolic of the weapons and attire that early Maroons had used during warfare. Valerie Wright (1986) states, "During the war, it was always that when the enemy would come upon you, our leader would always [put] himself in green leaves that we call ambush. When the enemy come upon him, they couldn't find him. He was looking like a jungle of bush. And right now down by Old Town, we have Maroon bush."

Over the course of the day, some ten different songs were performed. Breaks between songs could last anywhere from one to five minutes while performers rested or informally discussed the next songs that should be performed. Figure 4 lists the song titles, song lengths, performance locations, and the order of their performance.

Figure 4. Songs performed on January 6, 1986

Title of Song        Length   Location

Maroon Law            5:15    Kindah
Live Poorly           5:17    Kindah (Officials leave
                               for Old Town)
Poor Ramsey           4:35    Kindah
Squire Smith          8:30    Kindah
Easy Walk in Deh     11:50    Kindah
Song title unknown    4:35    Kindah (Some dancers
                               begin to experience myal)
Kromanti song         3:10    Kindah
Live Poorly           5:50    Kindah
Ban' Gwan             8:15    Kindah (More dancers begin
                               to experience myal)
Easy Walk in Deh      2:15    Kindah
Song title unknown    7:50    Kindah
Poor Ramsey           3:10    Kindah
Live Poorly           4:00    Kindah (Officials return
                               from Old Town and food
                               is served)
Kromanti song         6:00    Kindah (Dancers march in
                               small circle under the tree)
Easy Walk in Deh      1:52    Processional from Kindah to
                               Kojo's Monument
Maroon Law            7:32    Processional through town
Clear Road            9:37    Processional through town
Live Poorly           1:28    Processional through town
Ban' Gwan             4:55    Processional through town
Easy Walk in Deh     10:05    Processional through town
Clear Road           17:23    Processional through town

Just as the song texts reflect the mixture of English with African languages, the same can be said for the music performed on January Sixth. The fusion of elements from various African and European cultures is manifested in the form, melody, and rhythmic organization of songs. The form of Accompong Maroon songs is strophic. The same melody and text, with minor variations, are performed throughout each song. The length of each song or melodic time span (the number of measures it takes for a song to be performed once) varies. Some songs, such as "Easy Walk in Deh" and "Clear Road" (see Appendix), are short. "Easy Walk in Deh" is based on a two-line text (Easy walk in deh / Walk in a yard) repeated twice to a different melody (see mm. 1-2 and 5-6 for the first melody and mm. 3-4 and 7-8 for the second melody). The text of "Clear Road" is also short:

   Clear road-oh
   Oh all the force a comin.
   Clear road-oh
   Clear road a maam ay.

The melodies of all songs are straightforward. When transcribed into Western notation, the number of measures or bars for each song is symmetrical and based on multiples of four: "Maroon Law" is 16 bars, "Easy Walk in Deh" is 4 bars, and "Clear Road" 4 bars. "Live Poorly" is interesting because the song is not symmetrical. When performed the first time, the melodic time span is fourteen measures (see mm. 1-14) because the b in measure 13 is extended to six beats. But in all repeats (see mm. 15-27), the melodic time span is thirteen measures.

Similar to a West African drum ensemble, where the master drummer is the primary improviser, the vocal leader in a Maroon ensemble can be regarded as the "master" musician because she freely and spontaneously changes her part. For example, "Live Poorly" can be divided into three sections: A (mm. 1-6 and 15-20), performed by leader and chorus; B (mm. 7-8 and 21-23), sung by the leader; and C (mm. 9-14 and 23-27), sung by leader and chorus. While the length of A and C is set, with only occasional variation, the length of the B section fluctuates. The leader may sing the lead part immediately after the chorus (see mm. 21-23) or decide not to perform anything during the B section (see mm. 7-8). Thus the B section is always in flux, allowing for individual variation within the collective, which adds interest to the performance.

As in most African musical traditions, call-and-response is central to the performance. Occasionally, the leader and chorus overlap, with both singing different melodies such as in "Clear Road." At other times, the two parts are performed in unison, separating only occasionally (see "Live Poorly"). The call-and-response used in "Maroon Law" is slightly different. The group's response is almost the same each time it is performed (see mm. 5-8 and 13-16). However, the leader alternates between two different melodies, and the second melody is a little more complex (see mm. 9-12).

The melodies of songs performed on January Sixth are based on both additive rhythms, a hallmark of African music, and divisive rhythms, which are more characteristic of Western music;(24) see the melody in "Maroon Law" (m. 5) for additive rhythms and "Live Poorly" (mm. 3-4) for divisive rhythms. The prominence of dotted quarter notes (creating a 3+3+2 additive rhythmic pattern) in the melody for "Maroon Law" is significant, for dotted quarter notes are also used in a "gumbay" song and a digging song collected and transcribed by Olive Lewin (1970, 69-70).(25) This additive rhythm creates a movement that can be described as long-long-short, which is similar to time-line patterns used in other Caribbean musical forms such as mento, calypso, and rumba (see Ex. 2). Since additive rhythms distinctively characterize African music, is it possible that the use of dotted quarter notes in a sequence is an African-derived element that serves as a marker of Maroon identity? Could the long-long-short movement also be a signifier of African influence in Maroon music, particularly since this pattern is also found in other Caribbean musical forms? Until more analysis is done, we can only speculate that this is the case.

[Example 2 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Although monophony dominates the singing, parallel harmony in thirds occurs intermittently in the song choruses (see "Live Poorly," mm. 20 and 25-26) and when two people sing the lead part of some songs (see "Easy Walk in Deh," m. 5). The melodic range or ambitus of most songs is an octave; only "Maroon Law" is less, a major sixth when no harmony is performed. Much of the music is based on a hexatonic scale, but in several songs, one note of the scale is not prominently used and is most often employed as a fill-in (see the a in "Easy Walk in Deh," beat 4 of mm. 3 and 7), suggesting that the scale used for some songs may actually be pentatonic.

The rhythmic organization of Accompong Maroon songs shows influences from Western culture, probably because the music is used primarily for marching and much of the instrumentation as well as the instrumental performance style is derived from Christian revival songs. Unlike some west and central African music that is rhythmically based on multiples of three or six, the majority of Maroon songs that I transcribed and analyzed are organized in a duple meter. The bass drum serves as timekeeper and is struck with a very strong pulse either on the first or the first and third beats of each rhythmic unit or time line (the ostinato or basic rhythmic pattern that is repeated continuously throughout a song). The rhythm played by the bass drum guides the dancers' movements. The rattle drummers play a more intricate repetitive pattern, which is slightly varied during the performance of each song, but the pattern is in no way improvisatory. The length of the rattle drummers' time line also varies. For example, the time line for rattle drummers in "Maroon Law" is based on eight beats, while the one for "Live Poorly" is two beats. Because of the nature of the performance at Kindah, it was difficult to hear or record the gumbe part; other instruments and ambient noise at the site muffled it. However, gumbe music performed for me by one of the drummers in a private recording session yielded rhythms that are not very different from those performed by the rattle drummers (see Ex. 3).

[Example 3 ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Although three or four drums, tuned to different pitches, are included in the ensemble, the interlocking cross-rhythms and interplay of parts, which distinguish African drumming from that of other cultures, are not as prominent in Accompong Maroon music. Except for the cross-rhythms that sometimes result from the juxtaposition of the singers' additive rhythms against the drummers' divisive rhythms (see "Maroon Law"), the rhythmic component of Accompong Maroon music sounds more Western than African. A divisive rhythmic structure tends to be used, and the drummers perform basically the same rhythm in unison (see rattle drum and bass drum parts in Appendix). Occasionally, the gumbe player improvises, but his playing does not move or drive the performance in the same manner as that of the master drummer of a West African drum ensemble because the competing sounds at the celebration (singers, abeng, round and bass drummers) drown out his part. In contexts where the soundscape is less dense--for example, during the evening performance on the eve of January Sixth--the gumbe part is more audible. In this instance, one can hear how the drummer sometimes changes his rhythmic pattern when the singers come to the end of a melodic phrase (see the change to an additive rhythm in "Maroon Law," m. 8). Anticipating the end of the group's response in measure 16 of "Maroon Law," the gumbe player begins to perform a flurry of eighth notes in measure 14. Commenting on gumbe drumming, Bilby (1992, 20) states:

   The drumming style appears to have resulted from syncretism between old
   European military drumming traditions (with possible influences from
   Jonkonnu and Revival-style drumming) and African-based elements from an
   older traditional Maroon style. Against the pulse of the bass drum and the
   continual rolling of the side drums, the gumbe plays a series of "cutting"
   rhythms that give the music a distinctive flavor.

The Kromanti song sounds more African than the others, but it is difficult to explain why. Besides the language, which is obviously different from the Jamaican Creole used in other songs, the song's rhythmic organization, a triplet figure, is noteworthy. The music does not fit neatly into a strict duple meter. Even when performed by a group (see Bilby 1992, 19), there seems to be more freedom and flexibility in the performance.

Because the abeng is played freely and its sounds are not structurally related to the music performed by other instrumentalists and singers, the music that emanates from it can be regarded as climatic sound effects or sounds of alert that not only heighten the excitement but add to the overall density of the soundscape. Since the celebration commemorates the Accompong Maroons' victory in war, the sounds from the abeng are also sonic symbols of rebellion.

Some songs performed on January Sixth have special meanings and are associated with specific activities during the celebration. "Maroon Law," performed at the beginning of activities at Kindah and toward the beginning of the processional through town, can be regarded as the Maroon state anthem because the text refers to details of the treaty: "Maroon law hol' oh / Maroon Law hol' a ready ay, / Lan title worl' oh." Sylvia Salmon (1986) explains, "Maroon fought for their life. And when they won it, they still have the song that's `Maroon law hol'.' They still have their lands. So they say `land title, hold out.' That means their lands are free. The land that they fought [for], it's still hold out until now." Bilby (1992, 21) suggests that "Maroon Law" celebrates "independent `Maroon law'--the Maroons' right to govern themselves, won through years of struggle, and guaranteed by their 1739 treaty with the British." When I asked Robert Hill (1997), a native of Jamaica and professor of history at UCLA, to listen to "Maroon Law," he suggested two interpretations of the song's meaning and of the phrase "hold out":

   "Hold out" could have multiple meanings. It could mean that the recognition
   of the land title has been withheld from the Maroons by the colonial state
   because there has been a long-running dispute over their land titles.
   Although the land was claimed by the Maroon ancestors, and the contemporary
   Maroon community still upholds that claim, recognition of that claim has
   been withheld.

   If one would take the larger context of the song, it could mean that the
   surrounding communities of people have lost their land.... And very often
   they lost it to bauxite companies [that] bought their land for little or
   nothing, which is what fueled the migration to England in the early
   fifties. The peasants sold their land and then went to England. It could
   mean that in contrast to those people who lost their land, the Maroons
   still hold out and still have a claim that is lawful to their land, have a
   title to the land. It could be an affirmation, like a celebration of Maroon
   victory. It is triumphant. There is something triumphal.

   And it could be both. It could be both expressing a grievance as well as
   underscoring Maroon determination to fight for their land. It could be
   simply marking ... a kind of indomitable spirit, an indomitable courage, a
   Maroon obstinacy in the face of people who would have liked to have eroded
   those rights; the Maroons have stood firm.

"Live Poorly" was sung four times during the day, including when officials left and returned from Old Town. The song comments on the Maroons' state of mind when they were at war. Because life continues to be difficult, the song is applicable to modern times. James Anderson (1986b), the person who led members of the Kojo Council to Old Town during the celebration in 1986, explains: "It's an old-time song.... `So in a war, in a war, but we live poorly oh.' Sometimes you not live all right. So song say we live poorly.... Sometimes you need many things. And you don't have it. So the song say, you live, but you live poorly." After listening to a recording of "Live Poorly" sung by James Anderson, Hill (1997) stated that "Live Poorly" sounds like a lament: "He's saying something about war. He's contrasting the state of war, which accounts for his living poorly. He's lamenting that his circumstances are bad, and I hear the word `war.' So I think that [he's saying], `As a result of what we had to go through, we don't have very much. I'm living poorly.'"

Accompong Maroons refer to "Easy Walk in Deh" and "Clear Road" as marching songs, but the former is more flexible in terms of its performance context. In 1986, "Easy Walk in Deh" was performed at Kindah, when people not in trance attempted to revive or assist those who had gone into trance, and it was also heard during the processional. "Clear Road" was used only for the processional. The song text--"Clear road oh, all de boss [or folks] a come oh'"--suggests that the song is used to clear the way so that the marchers and their leader, constituting the force, can pass. Olive Sylvia Rowe (1986) states that marching songs are different from other songs performed at Kindah.

   "Clear Road," that is a marching song. We marching from the playground,
   going to Parade [Ground], and go down the monument there. That one is a
   marching song. Round a Kindah, round there now, you could hear that we sing
   a different song. When [we] are down at the tree round there, we sing
   ["Squire Smith"]: "Whole a night me in a hill top in a macca(26) ay. /
   Whole a night me in a hill top in a macca ay. / Squire Smith nuh gi me
   nutten oh good mawin' ay." So that is a different song from this marching
   song. So in many things what we doing, we have it different.

As noted in the foregoing, experiencing myal is an important feature of the celebration, for this is an opportunity for the community to communicate with ancestral spirits. Kromanti or grave-digging songs are performed when participants go into trance, probably because of their identification with early Maroon culture. In 1986, when one of the singers, Vita Baker, went into trance and fell to the ground, Miss Ruby immediately began to chant a Kromanti song in a slow, free rhythm. When the drummers heard the chanting, they stopped performing their ostinato pattern, allowing the participants to continue singing the Kromanti song a cappella. As Baker sat on the ground in trance, the core performers stood over her while one of them intermittently shook the rattle vigorously, and the drummers sporadically performed a drum roll. This free style of playing continued until Baker returned to her normal self.

A Kromanti song was not prominently heard again until the much later in the celebration. When Madge Sinclair fell to the ground, it was not a Kromanti song but "Easy Walk in Deh" that was performed, as rum was rubbed on her face and some of the dancers and drummers moved her body from side to side. When Miss Ruby and a few of the other core performers experienced trance, "Easy Walk in Deh" and another song (title unknown) were sung while drummers played their ostinato rhythm. Only a few people chanted Kromanti music. It was not until after the food was served and more people were experiencing royal that Kromanti singing dominated the performance. At this time, the drummers maintained their strict repetitive rhythmic patterns as everyone sang the Kromanti song in a slow fashion. When dancers marched in a small circle underneath the mango tree in reenactment of the behavior and movement of the early freedom fighters, it was as if the Accompong Maroons had spiritually connected and become one with their ancestors. The integration of all these features (music, religion, movement) at one particular moment not only heightened the spiritual affect, but this synergy created a reality that served as a marker for Maroon identity. The ritual had reached a climax similar to the point when an African-American folk preacher ends his sermon and the congregation is on its feet, shouting and dancing to the spirit of the words and music.

While most Accompong Maroons embrace the celebration and all of its manifestations, some Maroons' ambivalence about myal has negatively affected their attitude toward traditional Maroon culture and the expressive forms associated with January Sixth. In the early 1900s, myalism had become such a prominent part of the celebration that officials felt that one way of controlling the practice of the religion was to stop the celebration (Williams 1938, 391). Dunham (1946, 56, 68) had difficulty obtaining information about war dances because the colonel of Accompong disapproved of religious practices associated with Africa. Edwin Peddy, who was considered to be the best gumbe player in Accompong, did not perform at the 1986 celebration because, as a Christian, he felt that he was not supposed to be involved in such practices (Rowe 1986). In an interview with me on Sunday, January 5, 1986, James Anderson would not perform songs associated with the January Sixth celebration because he is a churchgoing Christian; he explained, "We don't do that on Sunday." He gladly sang Maroon songs for me on the day after the celebration.

Although some people have ambivalent feelings about myalism, the religion is tolerated and accepted on January Sixth by most Accompong Maroons because it serves as a marker of Maroon identity. While some restrict their involvement in the celebration because of conflicts with their religious beliefs, the majority wholeheartedly embrace the event and all of its affectations. For the latter, January Sixth is one of the few opportunities to participate publicly in traditional Maroon religion without inhibitions. The musical event becomes a ritual in which the Maroons not only celebrate their identity and renew their kinship with each other, they also communicate with the ancestors. Indeed, if Kojo's spirit is not satisfied with the celebration, the community is expected to do it again. According to James Anderson (1986b), "Anytime the master give, he not too suit [he is not pleased], we call back it again. Kojo will [appear in a] dream [to] someone and let his spirit [know it] is not to his suit. They must keep it over again.... And that person tell the colonel, and they can have a meeting at the monument and tell everyone around."

Summary

The January Sixth celebration embodies Maroon identity and represents aspects of culture that are important to the Maroon people. On that day, many Accompong Maroons put aside their taboos and ambivalent attitudes toward the old religion, music, dance, and instruments because they know that these symbols represent power; they help them to remember and celebrate their history, heroes, and sovereign state. The music and dance become the spirit of the people. From a theoretical point of view, this celebration demonstrates that we are not "dealing with separate symbols, but with clusters made up of objects, actions, sounds, states, odors, contacts, each unit, act, or thing, at once itself and standing for more than itself, the ensemble making up more than the sum of its parts. In the celebratory process we cannot detach the participants from what they participate in, the subject from the object" (Turner 1982, 19).

The music event also clearly reflects the beliefs and values of the Accompong Maroons. Not only does the celebration serve as a lifeline to the past, but it allows the participants to move between time and to connect with the future. Because the January Sixth event commemorates the deeds of warriors and because Accompong females are subsidiary to males in this arena, women do not play a key role in certain activities associated with the celebration: men do all of the cooking, no female animals are cooked on that day, and women rarely go to Old Town, Kojo's burial ground. In the performing arts, however, the position of Maroon women is comparable to that of men, even though they play different roles. In this instance, singing is not subsidiary to playing an instrument. Without song, the performance lacks meaning. Women are also the primary participants in myalism, an important aspect of the celebration.

Fused with elements from various African and Western cultures, the songs performed on January Sixth remind the Maroons of the treaty, their sacred charter, which brought a change so profound as to mark a new beginning, a new reality. It does not matter that only one or two Kromanti songs are remembered or that the literal meanings of other songs have been lost. The treaty, and by extension the celebration, provides them with an opportunity to remind others of their identity and position in Jamaica. The treaty cannot be broken, revoked, or ignored without undermining this collective identity (Kopytoff 1979, 60-61).

Comments by Olive Sylvia Rowe (1986) sum up the importance of the event to people in Accompong: "We have no more player [celebration] before the sixth. Everybody just keep back till the sixth. When the sixth come, we have a lovely player. So that is our Christmas when the sixth come. So if you should come back for another sixth, it's the same thing! We keep up the same sixth of January. We have the same song."

Events surrounding the Accompong celebration during December 1985 and January 1986 were documented and organized into a video (DjeDje, Merrill-Mirsky, and Richmond 1988). The project was funded by the UCLA Academic Senate, Center for African-American Studies, and Institute of American Cultures and was accomplished with the cooperation and assistance of all the residents of Accompong. I also want to thank the African Caribbean Institute of Jamaica for transcribing song texts; Robert Hill, Beryl E. Robinson, and Horace D. Robinson, for assisting me in interpreting song texts; Eddie S. Meadows and Beulah Brown for reading drafts of this paper and making valuable suggestions; and graduate students at UCLA (Kimasi Browne, Kevin Delgado, Clarence Henry, and Laura Osborn) for assisting me with my research.

(1.) An Akan term (Alcan speakers live primarily in present-day Ghana and Cote d'Ivoire) for a male born on Monday, the name has various spellings: Cudjoe, Kwadwo, and Kojo. The former is the version most often used in early literature on the Maroons. In modern times, Accompong Maroons prefer the spelling "Kojo." At Kojo's Monument, located in the heart of the Accompong, a sign marking the site reads "In Memory of Kojo."

(2.) A variety of definitions exists for the word "maroon." According to Richard Price (1979, 1-2), the English word "maroon," like the French marron, derives from the Spanish cimarron, which "originally referred to domestic cattle that had taken to the hills in Hispaniola ... and soon after to Indian slaves who had escaped from the Spaniards as well ... By the end of the 1530s, it was already beginning to refer primarily to Afro-American runaways ... and had strong connotations of `fierceness,' of being `wild' and `unbroken.'" Today, the term has broader implications; wherever runaway slaves existed in the Americas, they are called Maroons. See Price (1979) for an extensive discussion of Maroon societies in the Spanish Americas, the French Caribbean, the United States, Brazil Jamaica, and the Guianas.

(3.) See the Reference List and Discography for works by and coauthored by Kenneth M. Bilby in which Maroon culture, music, and religion are discussed, as well as related works by him dealing with cultural diversity, syncretic religious practices, and reggae music. See also Roberts (1924; 1925; 1926), Beckwith (1924; 1929), Hurston (1990), Dunham (1946), Leaf (1948), and Clerk ([1913] 1975).

(4.) For discussions of the diverse influences on the creation of African-American cultures and their impact on music making, see Mintz and Price (1992) and DjeDje (1998). See Kartomi (1981) for a detailed examination of issues related to musical culture contact.

(5.) Writers on Jamaican history refer to the Akans variously as Coromantee, Coromantes, Coromantin, Coromantine, Coromantyn, Kormantine, Koromantee, Koromantyn, Koromanti, and Kromanti, names derived from the name of the Fante town Koromantyn, a port in the Gold Coast from which many Africans were exported to the New World (see Roberts 1926, 342; Robinson 1969, 31; Patterson 1979, 256; Hall-AUeyne 1982, 9; Campbell 1988, 44). Dalby (1971, 37) prefers "Kromanti" to distinguish the modern use of the term from the historical form, "Coromantee." It is doubtful that all the Africans who went through the Fante port were Akan speakers, because the English often traded along the Windward Coast (the area extending from present-day Sierra Leone to Cote d'Ivoire) before entering the Gold Coast for new shipments; however, the entire cargo of the two areas would be listed as from Koromantyn. Of the Akans transported to the Caribbean, the majority were taken to Jamaica, because they were most sought after by British planters in the colony (Campbell 1988, 44). For a full discussion of Coromantees and other ethnic groups in Jamaica, see Kopytoff (1976a).

(6.) The origin of the Leeward Maroons is not clear Many scholars (e.g., Robinson 1969, 31-32; Robinson 1993, 23-25; Campbell 1988, 46) support Dallas's claim that the Leeward Maroons formed as a group during an escape that took place in 1690 on the Sutton Estate in the parish of Clarendon (Dallas 1803, 1:26-29). Patterson (1979, 256) is one of the few scholars who believe that the Leewards evolved as a group with a revolt that took place in 1673 at Sebly's plantation in the parish of St. Ann. Kopytoff (1978, 292-293) suggests that escapees from both the 1673 and 1690 revolts formed the core leadership of the Leeward Maroons. The term "Maroons" was originally confined to the body of Africans who fled with the Spanish fugitives in 1655, and it was not until about 1730, when Kojo became formidable and war parties were sent against him, that he and his people were included in the appellation (White 1973, 302).

(7.) The term Accompong is also of Akan derivation. According to Dalby (1971, 48-49), Accompong comes from the Akan Akyeampon, but there has been confusion in Jamaica between this personal name and the Akan Nyankopon, the word for God. Johnny, according to Campbell (1988, 46-47), "may have been another Akan name, Gyani, having suffered from Anglo-Saxon orthography." She also suggests that the identification of the two as Kojo's "brothers" may have been a direct transfer of the Asante (Ashanti) tradition in which people who belong to the same group address one another as "brother," although there may be no blood tie. In Africa, their fraternal relationship insured unity, as it did among Kojo and his brothers.

(8.) For different interpretations regarding the treaty signing, see Birhan (1985) and Robinson (1969, 46-50; 1993, 87-100). While Birhan documents the oral tradition as presented by most Accompong Maroons, Robinson describes the treaty signing from the perspective of the British. Kopytoff (1979) provides an interesting analysis of why the two groups perceive the circumstances surrounding the signing of the treaty differently.

(9.) Scholars differ on use of the term obeah. Whereas Brathwaite (1971, 219) refers to the obeah-man as a doctor, philosopher, and priest, Alleyne (1988, xii) defines obeah as the practice of magic in Jamaica and the English-speaking West Indies. According to Alleyne (83), the original Asante word for sorcerer, obayifo, was preserved in the term obeah. The term for priest, okomfo, preserved among Maroons in the term Kumfu-man ("ritual specialist"), gave way quite early in the language of most Jamaicans to the term myalman, based on royal (of obscure origin), meaning "spirit." Myalman therefore literally means "spiritman."

(10.) Olive Lewin (1968; 1970; 1971; 1983) has written extensively about Jamaican folk songs. In an attempt to make connections regarding cultural transmission between Africa and Jamaica, Richard Rath (1993) uses songs included in Sir Hans Sloane's A Voyage to the Islands ... (1707).

(11.) Jamal song is also known as jamma, "a folk song sung primarily to accompany communal field-digging and secondarily to accompany dancing and games at wakes, etc. The song comments on local happenings" (Cassidy and Le Page 1980, 243). Although she decided not to focus on them, Roberts (1925, 151; 1926, 345) found that revival hymns were plentiful, as are work and Anansi story songs. In more recent research, Bilby (1981a; 1992) has collected several songs associated with procession, a Kromanti song, a revival song, and an example of Nyabingi or Rasta drum music (for further discussion of Nyabingi, see Bilby 1992, 21).

(12.) This statement by Beckwith is not accurate. There is much evidence in the literature to show that epics and other types of story songs are common in certain parts of Africa (see Niane 1965; Biebuyck and Mateene 1969; Innes 1974; Okpewho 1979; Johnson, Hale, and Belcher 1997).

(13.) When Martin Luther Wright (1986) sang "Poor Ramsey" in an interview, he also was unable to provide a dear interpretation but suggested that the song referred to the theft of animals from town and someone being blamed for it. According to Beryl E. Robinson and Horace D. Robinson (1997), who were born in St. Elizabeth and Trelawny parishes, respectively, animals such as cows, goats, horses, and mules are symbols of wealth in rural Jamaica, so it is not surprising for them to be subjects of songs.

(14.) The grave-digging song recorded in Accompong in 1986 is similar to one collected by Roberts (1926, 349-350) in the 1920s. The same Kromanti song also appears in music collected by Bilby (1981a; 1992). Bilby (1981a, 10) states that though he was not able to obtain the meaning of Kromanti song texts from people in Accompong, religious leaders in Moore Town suggested that some words refer to "a type of garment (similar to a loincloth) which was traditionally used to dress the corpse of a Maroon before burial." For a description of a grave-digging ceremony, see Dunham (1946, 91).

(15.) For discussions of various types of dances performed among the Accompong Maroons, see Dunham (1946) and Leaf (1948). Note also that most works that include discussion of music provide some information on dance.

(16.) Individuals that Oliver N. Greene (1998) interviewed in Belize for his doctoral research stated that because women "are lighter and less resistant to religious spirits," they experience possession more readily than men. Whether this explanation can be extended to other religious phenomena and contexts (such as myalism and revivalism in Jamaica) is an area that needs further investigation.

(17.) Dunham (1946, 54) refers to this person as "Old Galleo" and indicates that he "died last year" (probably in 1934). Her discussion also briefly mentions the training that is involved in becoming an abeng performer.

(18.) When Cawley mentions "play," he is probably referring to the Kromanti play or Kromanti dance, a traditional religious ceremony that includes elements from African religions and Christianity, which is still performed by Windward Maroons in eastern Jamaica (see Bilby 1981b).

(19.) When Bilby visited in 1978, he noted that thousands of outsiders, including foreign tourists, had flocked to Accompong to witness the old Maroon traditions. The celebration had been advertised throughout the island, and it drew heavily (Bilby 1981a, 11). In 1986, not only did visitors and tourists who attended the celebration have to pay a small admissions fee, but vendors from outside Accompong who set up booths to sell products paid a fee as well. M. L. Wright (1986) states that during the early 1980s, attendance at the festival decreased, primarily because of the high cost of gas and transportation and other economic problems on the island. But Valerie Wright (1986) believes the attendance was improving later in the decade: "Every year it is becoming different. You see different people come along and people begin to come in earlier now than usual. First, we used to see people coming in from the second, third, fourth and the fifth [of January]. But now people will be here from December." According to George Brandon (1997), the number of people attending the celebration was enormous when he visited Accompong in January 1997. Not only did vendors and visitors have to pay fees, but drivers also had to pay money to park their cars in the town. Obviously, the celebration had grown significantly over the past eleven years.

(20.) Besides the abeng, gumbe, round, and bass drum, Wright states that musicians also "use a gourd rattle and boards; [they] put a board and a stick and knock it."

(21.) Among the Akan in Ghana, the umbrella is shaken to scare away evil influences (Atumpan 1963). Whether this is the case among the Maroons is not known. Myron Jackson (1997), a native of the United States Virgin Islands who has conducted research on Africanisms in the New World and has visited Ghana several times, reports that the umbrelia symbolizes nations and denotes someone of importance when used in a processional; the larger the umbrella, the more important the person.

(22.) Brandon (1997) indicates that in 1997 activities at the Kojo Monument included reggae and other modern styles of music. Because the celebration has become a major source of income for Accompong, Brandon states that every effort is being made to make the celebration appealing to a large cross-section of people. I do not know if the changes M. L. Wright and Valerie Wright wanted to make have been implemented.

(23.) The conference took place at the United Church of Jamaica and was attended by participants from New York City, San Francisco, and Los Angeles, as well as Kingston, Montego Bay, and other places in Jamaica. Among the Jamaicans were government officials and researchers from the University of the West Indies and the African Caribbean Institute of Jamaica. Representatives from each location greeted the Maroons and applauded them for their efforts to celebrate their heritage. Others made resolutions to assist them in their continuing struggle for recognition and sovereignty. A Maroon who lived in a town near Accompong, Abraham Fowler Kojo, was the guest speaker.

(24.) Divisive rhythms are those that articulate the regular division of the time span and follow the scheme of pulse structure in the grouping of notes. While divisive rhythms follow the internal division of the time span, additive rhythms do not. The durational values of some notes in additive rhythms may extend beyond the regular division in the time span (Nketia 1974, 128-129). For further discussion of the rhythmic organization of African music, see Nketia (1963, 64-93).

(25.) Lewin does not give the source for the digging song but states that the gumbay song was collected from St. Elizabeth parish. This is noteworthy because Accompong is also located in St. Elizabeth.

(26.) F. G. Cassidy and R. B. Le Page (1980, 284-285) indicate that macca refers to the formidable prickles of a macaw. Bilby (1992, 20) refers to "Squire Smith" as a topical song that recounts a past event involving a man known as Squire Smith.

DISCOGRAPHY

Bilby, Kenneth M. Black star liner: Reggae from Africa. Heartbeat HB 16 (1983).

--. Bongo, backra, and coolie: Jamaican roots. 2 vols. Folkways FE 4231/4232 (1975).

--. Drums of defiance: Maroon music from the earliest free black communities of Jamaica. Smithsonian Folkways CD SF 40412 (1992).

--. Jamaica ritual music from the mountains and the coast. Lyrichord LIST 7394 (1984).

--. Music of the Maroons of Jamaica. Folkways FE 4027 (1981).

--. Roots of reggae. Music from Jamaica: The jolly boys. Lyrichord LLST 7314 (1977). Bilby, Kenneth, and Elliott Leib. 1983. From Kongo to Zion: Three black musical traditions from Jamaica. Heartbeat HB 17.

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APPENDIX

Five Songs Sung on January 6, 1986 Transcribed by the Author(*)

[ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED]

(*)"Maroon Law" was transcribed by Kevin Delgado. The author transcribed all of the other songs.

JACQUELINE COGDELL DJEDJE is professor of ethnomusicology at UCLA. One of her most recent publications is California Soul: Music of African Americans in the West, co-edited with Eddie S. Meadows (University of California Press, 1998).3