After fighting for almost seven years for the Cajun/Zydeco category to be placed in Grammy voting, Terrance Simien is among the front runners to win the category. Well, the singer and squeezebox player has spent some 26 years touring and making albums, says the Opelousas Daily World.
Simien's Live! Worldwide CD is among the seven nominees for the first zydeco/Cajun Grammy, which will be issued at the 50th Grammy Awards on Feb. 10 at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Recordings by the Pine Leaf Boys, Geno Delafose, Roddie Romero and the Hub City All-Stars, Racines, Lost Bayou Ramblers and Lisa Haley are also in the running.
A native of Mallet in St. Landry Parish and resident of Lafayette, Simien has spent the last 26 years traveling the globe playing a fusion of zydeco, rock, soul, blues and more. Through the years, Simien, 42, has shared the stage and studio with Paul Simon, Los Lobos, the Dave Matthews Band, Stevie Wonder and others.
His Live! Worldwide disc features recordings from shows done over the past decade in Chicago, New York, New Orleans, Cuba, Australia and Mali, West Africa.
The Grammy addition has spurred a new sense of involvement in the awards by Louisiana's music community.
Thurs, Feb 7, at 2 pm, Lt Governor Mitch Landrieu and Mayor Cedric Glover will have a news conference to invite North Louisiana to share in the excitement. They will speak from Shreveport's historic Municipal Auditorium.
Zydeco and Cajun musics are a product of French fiddlers and singers working alongside African-American fiddlers and singers. Amedee Ardoin, a legendary black Creole accordionist and singer, helped lay the foundation for modern Cajun music in a series of recordings made between 1929 and 1934 with the great Cajun fiddler Dennis McGee, says cajunfrenchmusic,org.
Props must be extended to Shreveport's masterful Mudbug Madness festival for bringing Simien and other great Cajun and Zydeco acts to North Louisiana annually.
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