The world premiere of the documentary "When the drum is beating" (Tanbou frape), which tells the cross history of Haiti and of the "Orchestre Septentrional", will be held at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York, Monday, April 25, 2011 at 6:30pm.

Feature documentary, directed by Whitney Dow for "Two Tone Productions" interweaves the history of Haiti and that exceptionally long of the Septentrional Orchestra. The film made ​​back and forth between past and present: brutality of French colonialism, bloody revolution which gave freedom to Haitians, crushing weight of external debt, U.S. occupation, the advent of the brutal dictatorship of Francois Duvalier, and then the hope created by the arrival in power of Jean-Bertrand Aristide and the despair that followed his fall... to finally stop of the current problems the country faces.

In the midst of this history of sound and fury, for over 60 years, the "Orchestre Septentrional" has manages to remain active. The documentary, by meeting the musicians, by discovering their impassioned commitment, their cheerfulness and their dreams, is approaching of what made of ​​Haiti one of the most fascinating countries of this hemisphere.

The film is a co-production produced ​​with "Independent Television Service (ITVS)" in association with the "National Black Programming Consortium (NBPC)" thanks to the funding of the "Corporation for Public Broadcasting" in collaboration with TV Ontario and the support of "Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program".

To mark the world premiere of the film, a musical evening hosted by the Orchestre Septentrional will be given Friday, April 22 at the Tribeca Drive-In.

HL/ HaitiLibre