There was only our wide-eyed group of friends, two coolers of ice, a heap of frozen food we'd brought from the States, camping gear and a portable radio to play Bahamian rake-and-scrape hits on whatever radio station we could tune in.
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During June's Labour Day celebration, the island holds a Cat Island Rake and Scrape festival.
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ZNBN-FM is a radio station in Nassau, Bahamas broadcasting a Caribbean Music, Bahamian Junkanoo and rake-and-scrape radio format.
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Rake-and-scrape is a genre of music native to the Bahamas. Its main instruments are associated with the Goombay drum, Accordion also known as a Concertina, and a Hand saw.
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Avvy (born April 22, 1984) is a songwriter and performer contributing to the art of Bahamian folk music, Junkanoo and Rake-and-scrape. In 2014 his singles "Dirty Nagua Rake" and "Swing Swing" took top position in the local Bahamian charts.
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The sound is similar to a paper being ripped, and is believed to be the origin of the term ripsaw. Rake-and-scrape derives from the method used by a player to create sound from the saw. Though little is known for certain about ripsaw's genesis, two major theories include that the instrument was played to imitate the sound of the güiro, a Dominican and Haiti percussion instrument, and that Loyalist colonists in the United States brought their African slaves to the islands and these slaves invented the ripsaw to imitate the sound of the shekere instrument. In the Bahamas, Cat Island is the only place to celebrate rake-and-scrape on a large scale.
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Many have none, we shall > rake and scrape enough to do Howe's business, by favor of the Heaven.Adams, > John: Letters of John Adams, Addressed to His Wife, page 257. C.C. Little > and J. Brown, 1841. The initial enthusiasm of Patriot militiamen in the beginning days of the war soon waned.
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Powles writes "The music consisted of a fife, a large accordion and two tambourines"."The land of the pink pearl: recollection of life in the Bahamas" by Louis Diston Powles 1888 pg 297 The earliest found recorded usage of the Hand Saw in the Bahamas comes from a group called the "Fresh Creek Dance Band" from Andros, they were recorded in 1959.“Mama, Bake a Johnny Cake, Christmas Coming” by "Fresh Creek Dance Band" Smithsonian Folkways recordings 1959 In 1969 Charles Carter visited Cat Island and saw them raking the saw while playing music and he said it was Rake and Scrape although he claims that the people were already calling it that. Goombay music which is the original term used for Rake and Scrape in the Bahamas dates back to the 19th century where there were many bands playing many instruments together creating various sounds of early Goombay music.
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Ripsaw is a musical genre which originated in the Turks and Caicos Islands, specifically in the Middle and North Caicos. A very closely related variant, rake-and-scrape, is played in the Bahamas. Its most distinctive characteristic is the use of the common handsaw as the primary instrument, along with various kinds of drums, box guitar, concertina, triangle and accordion. The saw is played by scraping an object, usually an old knife blade, along the saw's teeth.
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Bahamian Americans have retained much of their cultural heritage. Bahamian Americans listen to and perform Junkanoo and rake-and-scrape music, engage in the classic art of West Indian storytelling about characters like Anansi, and create Bahamian-style art, especially straw weaving and canvas art. Bahamian foods staples such as conch, peas and rice, Johnny cake, and desserts including duff (food)s (especially guava) continue to be made by Bahamian Americans. Bahamian dialect is also spoken by many Bahamian Americans, especially in Florida.
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A closely related style called rake and scrape is known in the Bahamas, closely associated with Cat Island, the home of many Turks and Caicos islanders who moved there looking for work in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s. Many Bahamian musicians are from the islands, including The Cooling Waters, Sly Roker, Bradley Dean, Marvin Handfield, Perry Delancy, Leo Jones and . Many of these expatriates have since returned to Turks and Caicos, bringing with them Bahamian junkanoo music . Modern ripsaw pioneers include Tell and the Rakooneers and Lovey Forbes, who created a new style called combina in the early 1980s, using genres from across the Caribbean and the US as inspiration; these included jazz, calypso, soca and reggae .
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Aside from being a type of drum, goombay is also a percussion music made famous by Alphonso 'Blind Blake' Higgs, who played to tourists arriving at Nassau International Airport for several years. Rake-and-scrape music is a unique type of instrumental music made by bending a saw and scraping with a small object, most typically a screwdriver; it is used to accompany dances derived from European forms like polka and waltz. Rake-and-scrape's popularity has been declining in recent years, but performers like Lassie Do and the Boys continue to keep the tradition alive. Christian rhyming spirituals and the ant'ems of sponge fishermen are now mostly dead traditions, decimated by the arrival of pop music, a 1930s sponge blight and other causes.
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