V-Magazine-Naomi-Campbell

Haitian artist claimed two of the night’s most meaningful moments at the 2026 @caribmusicawards as rising dancehall star Ayetian (@1gyalevryday) took home Best New Artist after entering the night with seven nominations, and konpa legend @AlanCavé received the Elite Konpa Honor.⁠ ⁠ The fourth annual ceremony, held Saturday, September 19 at the National Academy for the Performing Arts, marked the awards’ first staging in the Caribbean after three years in Brooklyn. The dual spotlight on Ayetian and Cavé highlights both the new generation carrying Haitian sound onto global stages and the genre’s foundational voices.⁠ ⁠ Haitian-Jamaican artist Ayetian, entered the night as one of only a handful of acts with seven nominations, matching Machel Montano and V’ghn and trailing only Lady Lava’s nine. He did not sweep every category, but he left Trinidad with hardware: Best New Artist.⁠ ⁠ The win is a breakthrough for a 21-year-old whose hits “1 Gyal Every Day,” “Tip,” “Balance,” and “Wah Yo Deh Pon,” plus his recent project JamPack, have pushed a Haitian-Jamaican hybrid sound into the dancehall conversation. His nominations included Dancehall Best New Artist, Dancehall Impact Award, and collaborations such as “Wah Yo Deh Pon” with Govana and “Tip (Remix)” with Skillibeng.⁠ ⁠ For Haitian audiences, the moment was bigger than one trophy. A young artist raised in a Haitian household, now moving through Jamaica’s dancehall lane, walked into the region’s biggest music awards with seven nominations and walked out a winner.⁠ ⁠ Alan Cavé, the unmistakable voice of Zin and one of konpa’s defining solo artists, was named the 2026 Elite Konpa Honoree. Organizers cited his decades of work shaping the genre, from Zin-era classics to a solo catalog that has soundtracked generations of Haitian and diaspora listeners.⁠ ⁠ The honor arrives as the awards introduce a new Konpa Song of the Year category, placing Cavé’s recognition at a moment when the genre is being given fuller institutional space. His music including enduring records like “Se pa pou dat” has long carried Haitian culture beyond Haiti’s borders. ⁠ ⁠ 📸 @vybz.alone⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican

Marvins Antoine, an 18-year-old Haitian-American freshman running back at UMass Dartmouth, was fatally stabbed early Saturday in Providence after an altercation that began near a nightclub and spilled into a Wendy’s parking lot. A teammate was also stabbed. A 19-year-old fellow UMass Dartmouth student has been charged with murder.⁠ ⁠ Antoine died at Rhode Island Hospital from stab wounds to the chest. Police said the violence unfolded around 12:30 a.m. Saturday in the parking lot of the Wendy’s at 391 Charles Street, across from Mezzo Lounge. Officers found two young men with stab wounds. Kensley Macean, 19, a freshman defensive back on the same Corsairs team, was taken to the same hospital with injuries to the head, neck, and left arm that police described as non-life-threatening.⁠ ⁠ Both players had been at Mezzo Lounge with other teammates hours after UMass Dartmouth’s Friday night game. Police said the lounge became overcrowded and stopped letting people in. An altercation that started in or near the line moved across the street. Investigators have said they have not sure if Antoine and Macean were at the center of the first dispute, and Providence Police Chief Oscar Perez said there was no indication the suspect and the victims knew each other beforehand.⁠ ⁠ Police identified the suspect as Chukuwnonso Uzoma-eze, 19, a UMass Dartmouth student who is not on the football team. Witness interviews, surveillance video, and license-plate readers helped track him after he left the scene. He was taken into custody by UMass Dartmouth police on campus and later held by Massachusetts State Police. Providence police said a murder warrant is active in Rhode Island and that he is expected to be extradited. Murder is currently the sole charge announced.⁠ ⁠ Antoine was a 5-foot-10, 180-pound running back listed from Boston who starred at B.M.C. Durfee High School in Fall River after earlier time at Atlantis Charter. He had only recently begun college and had not appeared in a Corsairs game this season. Friends and former coaches described him as outgoing, funny, and full of promise a young man who had just started college two weeks earlier.⁠ ⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican

Happy Dessalines Day. 🇭🇹 ⁠ ⁠ Today, September 20, Haiti honors the birth of Jean-Jacques Dessalines, the man who finished the Haitian Revolution, declared independence, and made Haiti the first free Black republic in the modern world.⁠ ⁠ Born around 1758 on a sugar plantation near Grande-Rivière-du-Nord, he entered the world as Jean-Jacques Duclos, an enslaved child. Later purchased by a free man of color, he took the name Dessalines. By the time the great uprising of 1791 began, he had already lived the brutality of the plantation system that made Saint-Domingue the richest and most violent colony in the Caribbean.⁠ ⁠ He rose fast. As Toussaint Louverture’s lieutenant he proved a fierce, uncompromising commander. After the French captured Louverture in 1802 and Napoleon moved to restore slavery, Dessalines took the lead. The decisive moment came at the Battle of Vertières on November 18, 1803. French forces withdrew. On January 1, 1804, in Gonaïves, Dessalines proclaimed independence and restored the island’s Indigenous name: Haiti.⁠ ⁠ He became Governor-General for Life, then Emperor Jacques I. The 1805 constitution declared that Haitians would be known simply as “Blacks,” a political and racial statement of unity after centuries of colonial ranking. He ordered the remaining French killed, a massacre that remains one of the most contested acts of his rule.⁠ ⁠ He was assassinated on October 17, 1806, near Pont-Rouge. For generations Haiti marked that date as Dessalines Day. In 2020, President Jovenel Moïse added September 20 his birthday as a second official holiday, Jour de Dessalines. Haitians now honor him twice in the space of a month: once for the life that began in bondage, once for the death that ended an empire.⁠ ⁠ Dessalines was both liberator and autocrat. He ended slavery on the island permanently and showed the world that an enslaved population could defeat a European army and found a state. The flag itself blue and red, the white stripe of France torn out is tied to his era and to Catherine Flon, who sewed the first version.⁠ ⁠ 📸 @orlandooo7⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican

Nothing like Haitian worship! 🙌🏾⁠ ⁠ 🎥: mr.andeyo_/TikTok ⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican #haitian #culture

#LetsTalkAboutIt 🇭🇹 ⁠ ZIN co-founder Alex Abellard dropped a vintage tape. When Alex Abellard posts old ZIN footage, it is not just a throwback. It is a receipt.⁠ ⁠ The ZIN keyboardist, bandleader, and co-founder shared a vintage live clip that shows the group in full flight: Alan Cavé on vocals, the women on the front line, guitar and bass cutting through the room, drums and congas driving the floor, and a crowd that is not standing still. Hands are up. People are pressed in. The energy is physical. That is the ZIN live formula that made the New York–based band one of the defining kompa acts of its era.⁠ ⁠ Abellard’s caption cut straight to the point. This is how ZIN used to drop kompa and ambiance on the fans. Then the line that made the post travel: it looks like fans don’t take their pleasure at that level anymore.⁠ ⁠ That is not a random fan complaint. It is coming from one of the men who built the sound. Abellard co-founded ZIN in the late 1980s with guitarist-songwriter Eddy Saint-Vil and then brought in Alan Cavé, whose voice became the face of the group. Together they helped push a new generation of kompa romantic, tight, dance-floor ready through albums and live nights that packed rooms from New York to Haiti and across the diaspora.⁠ ⁠ Abellard’s post lands because it comes from inside the catalog. ZIN was never only a studio band. The reputation was built on nights like this Cavé’s voice, Abellard’s direction, a full live unit, and fans who came ready to go all the way with the groove. Whether today’s crowds still meet the music at that same intensity is the debate he opened. The footage is the evidence he put on the table. For anyone who grew up on ZIN, the clip is more than nostalgia. It is a reminder of what the band sounded like when the room belonged to them.⁠ ⁠ 🎥 @alexabellard #lunionsuite #haitianamerican

More apologies! Converse is facing backlash after two recent advertising images were widely compared to Ku Klux Klan and lynching imagery, first sneakers held beneath pointed white fabric, then a separate shot featuring shoes, a ladder, and a tree.⁠ ⁠ There is no public evidence either photograph was created with that intent. But for Black audiences, imagery tied to racial terror is not abstract. It carries documented history. When that context is missed at every stage of a global campaign, concept, shoot, edit, review, and distribution, questions about representation and accountability follow.⁠ ⁠ The first image, part of Converse’s Chuck 70 X campaign starring aespa member Karina, showed the K-pop star in a white skirt inside a star-shaped spotlight, holding a pair of black high-tops by the laces. Critics said the lighting tapered the fabric into a pointed white shape resembling a Klan hood, while the dangling shoes read as a hanging body.⁠ ⁠ The second image, from the Converse x Palmes collaboration, showed a person on a ladder beside a tree reaching toward sneakers hanging from a branch, with another figure looking up. Viewers connected the tree, ladder, and hanging shoes to lynching photographs that remain part of the American visual record.⁠ ⁠ Both images circulated rapidly on Threads and other platforms this week. On Friday, Nike-owned Converse issued a statement to Footwear News:⁠ ⁠ “We’re sorry. We understand why this image is deeply upsetting and recognize that we got this wrong. We removed it from our channels and are working to remove it everywhere it appeared. This should not have happened, and we will do better.”⁠ ⁠ The Karina photograph has been pulled from Converse’s main social channels. Reporting indicates the company is working to remove it from other placements as well.⁠ ⁠ An apology that names the harm and pulls the work is a start. It is not the end of the conversation. Carter and others have said a PR statement is not enough the public deserves to know how the images were conceived, reviewed, and cleared. ⁠ ⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican

The lone holdout juror in Lindsay Clancy’s Massachusetts murder trial has spoken publicly for the first time, saying he never doubted that the former labor-and-delivery nurse knew what she was doing when she killed her three children. Michael P. Desronvil, 48, of Bridgewater, was the only juror who refused to find Clancy not guilty by reason of insanity. After more than 38 hours of deliberations, the panel deadlocked 11-1. Judge William Sullivan declared a mistrial on Sept. 4. In a statement provided to NewsNation through a spokesperson, the Haitian-American juror said: “I didn’t have any doubts. As I tried to explain different possible theories during deliberation, I kept getting cut off as if I had doubts based on the evidence present. Based on all the physical evidence, key witnesses, and what the prosecution presents, I thought it was enough proof that she knew exactly what she was doing and planned.” Clancy, 36, admitted strangling 5-year-old Cora, 3-year-old Dawson, and 8-month-old Callan with exercise bands at the family’s Duxbury home in January 2023 before attempting suicide. Her defense argued postpartum psychosis. Prosecutors said she understood her actions. After Desronvil was identified, he said he received death threats, was doxxed, and left his home. His attorney, Edward Paltzik, said the juror is at an undisclosed secure location in rural Northern New England and called him an “American Hero and Champion of Justice.” A GiveSendGo campaign titled “Stand With the Juror,” have raised a little over $330,000 toward a $350,000 goal. Paltzik said proceeds would go toward necessities after threats, doxxing, & harassment. Desronvil comes from a Haitian immigrant family that settled in Massachusetts in 1982, when he was 4 years old. Reporting on his personal history, including dismissed 2021 domestic assault charges and later family court matters, has intensified public attention around the case. Those allegations were not convictions. The mistrial has split public reaction: some hail Desronvil for holding the line on criminal responsibility, while others criticize the deadlock & question how the jury was selected. #lunionsuite #haitianamerican

Haitian-American singer, songwriter, and producer @Fridayy has released the official music video for “Haiku,” the standout lead single from his third studio album Tension.⁠ ⁠ The clip arrived Friday, September 18, weeks after the album dropped August 14 via Def Jam. The song itself first landed July 24 and quickly became one of the project’s most streamed cuts, pairing Fridayy’s signature vulnerable vocals with breezy, Caribbean-tinged production.⁠ ⁠ “Haiku” follows a relationship that still lives rent-free in the narrator’s head. He wants to rewind time, send her a 5-7-5 poem instead of another late-night call, and prove the love was real even after things got messy. Guest vocals from ilham on the chorus give the record extra lift. Fridayy described the album as showing “a different side” of himself, still full of heart, but with more fun and rhythm. “Haiku” sets that tone.⁠ ⁠ For Haitians, Fridayy remains one of the most visible young voices carrying the culture on a mainstream stage. Tension continues that evolution with Caribbean rhythms woven through contemporary production.⁠ ⁠ The new video gives the record a visual world to match the mood: cinematic, intimate, and stylish. Fans immediately called it beautiful and urged streams of the full album. Fridayy continues to represent Haitian excellence without forcing it, just by being himself and letting the music travel. Another win for the culture.⁠ ⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican #haitian

Find your swilli baby, the diri to your sos pwa 😂😂 ⁠ on @rankontre⁠ #AD ⁠#lunionsuite #haitianamerican

The Grenadiers’ squad is set! 🇭🇹⁠ ⁠ Haiti’s new head coach, David Badia, has named 24 players for the national team’s upcoming Concacaf Nations League matches. The roster includes familiar faces such as Frantzdy Pierrot, Wilson Isidor and Fafa Picault, along with new call-ups Jonah Mednard and Kenny Quétant. ⁠ ⁠ Haiti will face Trinidad and Tobago on September 24 and Costa Rica on September 27. Both matches will take place at Sabina Park in Kingston, Jamaica, where the Grenadiers will play their designated home games. ⁠ ⁠ The team will then travel to face the Dominican Republic on October 1 and Costa Rica on October 4. Haiti is competing in Group A of League A, with a place in the quarterfinals at stake. ⁠ ⁠ With the squad announced and the first match just days away, Haitian supporters are being called on to bring their flags, fill the stands and make Sabina Park feel like home. ⁠ ⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican

A beautiful reminder of Haiti’s future 🇭🇹 ❤️⁠ 🎥: @haitian_pride09.⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican #culture

After selling out Boston Symphony Hall, Madison Square Garden Theater New York, Hard Rock Universal Orlando, Konpa En Symphony is coming to Miami for a must-see live experience. ⁠ ⁠ 📅 September 25, 2026, 7pm⁠ 📍 Kaseya Center, Miami⁠ 🎟️ Nulookmusic.com⁠ ⁠ Konpa with a full orchestra.⁠ Be there when it happens—not after everyone’s already talking about it. ⁠ ⁠ #lunionsuite #haitianamerican #ad