Mikaben

kompa, kompa-gouyad

Mikaben, the recording name of Michael Benjamin, was born in Port-au-Prince on June 27, 1981, in a home where music was already a family language. His father, Lionel Benjamin, was one of Haiti's major singers; Michael learned piano, guitar, bass, and drums, and began writing songs as a teenager. In the late 1990s, Telemax's Christmas song contest brought him public attention, and 'Ou Pati' in the Haitian Troubadours movement opened the door to a career that crossed kompa, twoubadou, gospel, pop, rasin, and the big diaspora stage.

Mikaben could enter many spaces without losing his center. He founded Krezi Mizik in 2005 with David Dupoux, maintained a solo career, produced, played guitar, sang in Creole, French, English, and Spanish, and collaborated with Carimi, T-Vice, J Perry, Kenny Haiti, BélO, Admiral T, Paul Beaubrun, and other artists from different musical worlds. 'Ou Pati', 'Ayibobo', 'Mwen Pare', 'Pouki Se Li', 'Kenbe m', 'Fe Lapli', 'Marry Me', and 'Tout Lwanj Se Pou Ou' show an artist able to place prayer, romance, loss, gratitude, and Haitian pride inside the same catalog.

His death onstage at the Accor Arena in Paris on October 15, 2022, during the Carimi reunion, made him part of Haiti and the diaspora's collective memory. But Mikaben should not remain only a tragedy. His strongest legacy is the way he turned generosity into sound: a singer who could carry a crowd, support social causes, gather other artists, and make a song feel like a personal message to each listener.

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