Lafayette Two-Step
from "From the Bayou to the Bay: Louisiana French Dance Music in Northern California." by Mark F. DeWitt, pg. 311-339
In The Music of Multicultural America
By Kip Lornell and Anne K. Rasmussen
This field recording from an after-Christmas party at a Cajun friend’s home in Sacramento, California illustrates Danny Poullard’s musical leadership in a jam session setting. Several others are playing along and singing to this repertoire standard, also known as 'Allons à Lafayette,' which was the first Cajun song ever recorded and is well-known to all who follow Cajun music. Nonetheless, he is playing a diatonic accordion in an unusual key (F, three semitones higher than his commercial recording) and he ends a false start by telling the guitarists the opening chord to this song (B flat) in this key. Rhythmically, he carries the entire room with his strongly accented playing and his insistent use of the chord button in the left hand throughout. When the fiddlers don't start playing the melody when they should (after the vocal), he plays the tune on his accordion long enough to get their attention and keeps the song going until they find a place to come in.
December, 1994, The home of Freida Fusilier, Sacramento, California.
Danny Poullard, Freida Fusilier, and friends