"La Rille Cajen" - Dennis McGee & Ernest Fruge

The Cajun Reel!  Dennis McGee's Scots-Irish roots truly come to form in his renditions of old Appalachian reels.  From their Anglo-American neighbors, Cajun musicians learned jigs, hoedowns, and Virginia reels to enrich their growing repertoire which already included polkas, contredanses, varsoviennes and valses-à-deux-temps.3  Learning from his father John McGee, uncles Ulysses McGee and Joseph McGee, and his cousins Oscar McGee and Theodore McGee, Dennis played—and joined in—on many contra and square dances in his courting days.

Every week they would pass on horseback and knock on every door to tell the people where the dance was.  And, chère, I believed I danced!  When I danced, everyone left the floor because I was the best.  They couldn't dance like I could.2   

Dennis McGee

But not all reels were danced to in south Louisiana.  One genre of traditional songs provided a link between the dance band and home songs: the "reels a bouche," similar to Celtic "mouth music." These were tunes that were sung—in particularly by women—to accompany round dances during Lent when instrumental performances were not allowed. The verses and meters of these pieces are generally simpler than those of the home music, but they are still a more private mode of expression than the dance hall numbers.4  

At the makeshift studio, the duo was introduced to Cajun humorist Walter Coquille.  Walter was attending the Brunswick session to kick off his series of spoken word recordings and decided to introduce McGee and Fruge's song to the listening public as "genuine Cajun breakdown music".  His 1930 New Orleans recordings of "La Rille Cajen" (#512) and "Dance Caree" were both tunes used in square dances.   The reel required more movement than other dancing styles such as the contredanse français.  Dennis recalled, 

The reel was a difficult dance and it took good legs.  You had to jump around quite a bit.3  

You can hear Coquille calling out dance instructions: "Avancez!", "Famille tout le tour!",  "Tourne la dame!"  Dennis spent many of his later years playing these same reels at places such as weddings. Dennis recalls:

I remember an old Indian woman we called Ma Carreau who sang at all the wedding dances. She had blue eyes and frizzy hair. She was a midwife.  She knew all the wedding songs. Her husband played the violin.  We would play the reels for fancy stepping, "pour fair des pas".2     

Leleux Dancehall, 1938
Courtesy of LOC, Russell Lee Collection

Recorded in 1930 in New Orleans during the depth of the Great Depression, the recordings suffered from poor record sales and were mostly forgotten.   Not long afterwards, the accordion became the dominant instrument throughout much of Cajun music.  Author Barry Ancelet explains:

Dennis McGee was around when what we now call Cajun music was invented, or was developing.  Because of how he learned and who he learned from, he was one of the last living links to our musical past.  He performed in a style that went back before the accordion had affected Cajun music as much as it has today.1  

1. "Cajun Fiddler Dead".  CPS. 1989.
2. Dennis McGee ‎– The Complete Early Recordings.  Liner notes. 
3. Cajun and Creole Music Makers By Barry Jean Ancelet
4. http://www.louisianafolklife.org/LT/Articles_Essays/creole_art_pub_priv_cajunm.html

Release Info:
NO-6713 La Rille Cajen | Brunswick 512
NO-6714 La Danse Carre | Brunswick 512 

Find:
The Early Recordings Of Dennis McGee: Featuring Sady Courville & Ernest Fruge (Morning Star, 1977)
Dennis McGee ‎– The Complete Early Recordings (Yazoo, 2006)