When people hear of Calypso today, they just as likely think of the sea nymph in Greek mythology, as of the musical fad of the late 50s to which she lent her name. With his rise to superstardom, especially Harry Belafonte garnered the genre increased attention. In the music assembled in this collection one can easily hear that Belafonte “borrowed” from many of the early performers and that some of his most successful titles had been popular a few years prior to his versions already. In the early days Calypso was a medium of communication, spreading messages of all kinds - the daily newspaper of the little man in song. Many residents of the “Islands in the Sun” took the contents of these songs, which often dealt with politics and topics of daily life - love, the adversities of fate, sex, lies, and alcohol -, as reliable message. The songs created space for free expression. Over time the music was mostly consumed as pure entertainment, especially in the late 1950s. This 10-CD BOX documents this “Folk music of the Caribbean”, which eventually gave rise to Ska and Reggae, from its origins via the highlights of the genre up to the decay of the Calypso boom.
