FI YI YI & The MANDINGO WARRIORS
NEW RECORD! When That Morning Comes
We are proud to present this release by Big Chief Victor Harris & the Mandingo Warriors who are noted for their unique African-style dress, exquisite beadwork, & original music. They are major contributors to New Orleans culture & community.
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ABOUT FI YI YI
Though the New Orleans Mardi Gras Indians are rightfully renowned for their artfully creative and magnificently adorned outfits, there is a much deeper significance to what they do and represent. It's about the important essence of community and the thread that links them to not only Native Americans but to the African continent – their original ancestry.
When Big Chief Victor Harris, The Spirit of Fi Yi Yi, stepped out on the streets in 1984 leading his gang the Mandingo Warriors for the first time, it marked a new era and a new look in the Black Indian Nation. Much in the African tradition, the Chief wore a full-face mask rather than a plumed or feathered “crown” (headdress) and used a stylistically African approach in designing the bead work. He's continued this artful conceptualization through the decades on suits of many colors.
Big Chief Harris, who in 2015 celebrated 50 years of masking Indian, boasts both old school Indian ways and a forward-thinking attitude. He's very aware that the aim of his year-round labor of sewing a suit and his reason for taking to the streets on Carnival Day is to bring joy to friends, family and onlookers in the neighborhoods. “It's like being a medicine man. It heals the community.”
Oh, yeah, he has some fun too. Harris approaches his role differently than any other Black Indian chiefs in the some 130-year history of the culture. A tall man with a impressive stature, the Chief looms large as he runs from curb to curb, forcefully hoopin' and a-hollerin' as the wide-eyed children along his route scramble in fright and delight. For that matter, many adults caught by the surprise of his mock fury, quickly step back to allow room for Fi Yi Yi.
In the mid-1960s, Harris became a member of the then newly-organized, youth-oriented Tambourine & Fan Social Aid and Pleasure Club. A multi-faceted organization, one of the group's first actions was marching to City Hall to demand that a park be established in or near the 7th Ward. The protest was successful and a small grassy patch just off of North Claiborne Avenue was set aside for sports and recreational activities. For five years, Harris coached a football team there and, importantly became close to another community activist, Collins Lewis, whom everyone simply called “Coach.” Decades later, Chief Harris would name him the Commissioner of the Chief's Sewing Table in the Spirit of Fi Yi Yi and the Mandingo Warriors.
Coach primarily remained in a supportive role in the gang. He skillfully wielded a needle and thread to create beautiful beaded designs for the Chief's suits, played drums and sang with the tribe in the traditional call-and-response of the Black Indian chants.
There is no mistaking the mighty Big Chief Victor Harris, the Spirit of Fi Yi Yi when he hits the streets leading the Mandingo Warriors. As tambourines ring and drums pound out rhythms that are both African and New Orleans in nature, the call is, “Who they talkin' about?” The response: “Fi Yi Yi!”
-Geraldine Wyckoff