Neo-traditional music, in fact, is originally a type of music that was designed to serve dancing, and we are talking here about a kind of music that is influenced by and comes from the British Isles – England, Scotland, Ireland – of course because during
the 1760 invasion, the British brought their cultural heritage with them and then suddenly it's like we were completely starting fresh.
So we kind of borrowed reels and jigs.
We didn't keep the French repertoire except for some songs of course, like À la claire fontaine.
But as far as music goes it's not the case at all, we really were influenced by the British.
Imagine that you are in the nineteenth century and that you are organizing a dance evening, then you obviously invite dancers and a fiddler, who was in fact standing up on a table to see the dancers.
A fiddler actually plays the violin, but he's also doing some podorhythmia (foot taping), and it's something particular we do here in Québec.
Here is an example of what podorhythmia is [demonstration of sounds produced when tapping your feet on the ground or on a board].
A little bit later, it was the twentieth century and we added some new instruments, instruments like the piano or the accordion.
But hey, we get to the 1930 s for example, and then jazz has a big influence, jazz swing from the 1930 s.
So pianists have greatly influenced the accompaniment part of the "trad" music.
Today, when we talk about neo-traditional music, "neo-trad" as we often like to call it, well we talk in fact about a product that was influenced by many, many, many things.
What is interesting to see is that we adapt our folklore to other musical styles.
It may be, for example, music that comes from Africa or any other culture in the world.
Music that we will borrow and make our own.
Of course we will integrate aspects from our culture, like foot tapping.
By keeping the violin or accordion for example, we will know that it is still our traditional Québec music.
It's just like the tree analogy: a tree has deep roots, and then eventually grows with branches going left and right that sometimes take unusual shapes.
It's the way I see the evolution of "neo-trad" music.