A Carnival Post Mortem.

Après Carnival-la and we are here in T&T reminiscing on what we’ve just experienced.

This was a different season for me, a returning to centre because I was never a big masquerader. All I did this year on Monday and Tuesday was J’Ouvert with 3Canal which was special. My first was their last as the band is closing the chapter on their mas. The music however will continue.

I also covered the Kings and Queens prelims and semis competition; the latter was also the finals of the Junior Kings and Queens competition. To be frank those shows can be tedious but rewarding. Both nights there was drama with fallen costumes and great stories from the crew backstage from lifelong masqueraders who have to come out to play.

Post Carnival there has a lot of talk of regret and concern about where the Carnival is going. We are always so fearful here about how we are being received by others. While I think there are aspects of the Carnival that concern me deeply, the state of kaiso, the scary lack of spectators on the road on Tuesday. I also think doom and gloom is neither helpful nor realistic.

Trinidad’s Carnival remains a rich expression. Over-commercialisation, however, is a major problem. We need more elements in the Carnival that are done for the sake of culture, and we the people have to appreciate them.

On Friday (16th February 2023) I attended Amanda McIntyre’s talk about her Babydoll mas. She describes the traditional mas character as “a triad representation of a doll, a girl and a woman in a single
performance” that could “be interpreted as either one, two or all of these three femininities.” Often dressed as a Victorian child in frills and a bonnet while holding a cloth doll.

A performer herself, McIntyre writes in the 2021 journal Tout Moun that the character, “carries a doll child and identifies male spectators as being the father of the child while scandalously demanding financial support.” She further explains that the character was first done in the late 19th century by men as parodies of women and “Their parodies were meant to ridicule single mothers for having children without first being married and for not knowing the paternity of their children.” That these mothers were often poor young girls seemed to be lost on the adults criticising them.

Today she is being reclaimed by activists to address child sexual abuse, single motherhood and female sexual health. And on Monday and Tuesday McIntyre lead an entire band of baby dolls, male and female on to the road to ‘play mas”. It is an important inclusion in the local Carnival lexicon and offers hope that more will follow.

A real conversation needs to be had about how we see mas. I think traditional mas has always struggled with its attractiveness to the younger population. It is seen as strange and perhaps uncool. Or maybe seen as artsy or unattainable.

Whatever the reason while we can champion the pretty costumes that everybody loves, they cannot be considered the meat of the Carnival dish. Masquerade requires more! We need pretty, we need the dutty! I want to see the Kings and Queens on the road. I want fashion, I want art, political statements and to be shocked by our mas. And I want more people to embrace the diversity we seem to be losing in the masquerade.

Personally by playing J’Ouvert I felt like I unlocked a new level in my Carnival experience. Also, as I get older I wonder about the options for the masquerader who does not always want to explore her sexy through mas. Amanda McIntyre’s Dolly Ma band had me buzzing in a way I did not expect. I am seeing All Stars Sailor Mas, Etienne Charles’ band and Moko Somõkõw as options for me. They may have a place in my consideration alongside Lost Tribe and K2K Alliance or any of the other pretty mas bands.

And it is my hope that more people see this as a necessary step in the evolution of the masquerade.

Why ‘This Caribbean Space’?

I went to the Monday Night Theatre Forum (MNTF) as a reporter with the Caribbean New Media Group (CNMG) in June 2016. I went to report on the talk that veteran actor, director and member of the rapso group 3Canal Wendell Manwarren had to say about his creative life in Trinidad and Tobago.

Formed by the Tony Hall and Raymond Choo King, both now decreased, he MNTF was held at the Trinidad Theatre Workshop when it was situated at 23 Jerningham Avenue in Belmont. It has since moved to St. Claire and a new entity is being constructed on the Belmont site.

MNTF was a space for the local theatre community to talk about their craft, history, wins and losses. And Wendell did all of that and more. His comments on the need for sacred spaces resonated with me. Deeply. In Trinidad and Tobago most of us live here thinking that our things lack meaning. Our buildings, sites and customs, his talk laid that bare in a way that was as revolutionary as it was obvious.

Eight years later the Caribbean space where he gave that talk is no more. It was, as is typically done in this country, torn down to construct something modern and new.

But we remain, needing a connection to our history in a way that informs who we are so that we could be better informed how to live fulfilling lives in these beautiful but wounded spaces. So that we stop acting as though we mean little and be resolute in our right to exist exactly as we are. That we have spaces in this country that centre and heal us. And that we aren’t always reeling from the hurt of mourning something that should have been precious to all, but whose true value was only known to a select few.

The name of this blog ‘This Caribbean Space” was a response to that call. The name makes me think of how Wendell spoke of the importance of the Big Black Box on Murray Street in Woodbrook, the performance space managed by 3Canal, that evening. It was once the home of Godfrey Sealey That linkage may be implicit to some, but it remains available to be shared especially for whom it really matters.

What I had hoped for this blog is that it helps to shed light, not just on our built history, but our customs as well. As a journalist I get to do a lot of interesting things. I have too often learnt things as an adult I wish I knew earlier. Much earlier. My hope is to share some of the stories I have worked on throughout the years, new original work that explores who we are, and why This Caribbean Space matters far beyond the tourist traps we are often associated with.

Soca Music Turns 50

Worthy of an article in a mainstream publication, but Caribbean Beat, the inflight magazine of Caribbean Airlines, should not be overlooked for consistently covering some of the most important and sadly unreported stories in Caribbean news and history.

Anyway my friend Nigel Campbell wrote this important article marking the 50th anniversary of soca for the Jan/Feb 2023 edition of Caribbean Beat Magazine. It’s important because the real history is murky, and we the people deserve more than the sanitised version that we’ve been fed.

Last August, for Trinidad and Tobago’s 60th Independence anniversary I FINALLY used a pre-pandemic interview with Martin ‘Mice’ Raymond and Omari Ashby to discuss the evolution of soca for a special on CNC3. Both are full of gems and worth listening to and give insight to soca’s messy origin story.

You can read Nigel’s brilliant article below.

“It’s been 50 years since soca music emerged in Trinidad & Tobago. Nigel A Campbell looks back at the birth and evolution of the music that’s become the soundtrack to Caribbean carnivals around the world — and continues to seek a commercial life beyond it.”
SOURCE

Roger Robinson’s poems of Trinidad and London win Ondaatje prize — Repeating Islands

Alison Flood (The Guardian) reports that British-Trinidadian poet Roger Robinson won the Royal Society of Literature’s Ondaatje prize. A Portable Paradise is the second poetry collection to win the award for a book that conjures “the spirit of a place.” In his interview, he says, “I want these poems to help people to practise empathy.” […]

via Roger Robinson’s poems of Trinidad and London win Ondaatje prize — Repeating Islands

BussHead: The Video

I’ve been waiting for this video to be released for so many months now. I’d heard snippets from the set from the Producer, and some of the co-ordinators, and have waited with baited breath for its release and finally it’s out.

The video released on The Fader Friday.

My friend Laura at LoopTT interviewed Machel after the video came out, he told her, “The intention was to show the story of this youth acting out of anger and rage… that people were there for him to be able step in and help him channel that negative energy into something positive. That untapped raging energy could easily be used as a weapon to take someone’s life. Instead, the imagery is that two elder people stepped in and showed him that you could channel that energy into something positive so basically he became an instrument of the art which preserves the art and give the art longevity.”

I know that is something Keegan Taylor, one of the songwriters, and Rondel Benjamin feel passionately about. Keegan and Rondel are the principals that formed Bois Academy, a group that is determined to bring the indigenous martial arts of Trinidad and Tobago out of the shadows and into the light.

Rondel truly believes that our martial arts can provide a channel for the aggressive energy some of our youth have, and it through kalinda and jab jab, they can learn to harness that anger and turn it into positive energy.

Bois Academy has teamed up with Ronald Alfred the King of the Jab Jab to offer training in Kalinda and Jab Jab every Sunday 4pm at St. George’s Grounds in Barataria.

Check them out!

Smallman: A Film Review

I stumbled across Smallman: The World My Father Made while doing research for another post. I pressed play because it was a short film about my friend’s father. I know Richard Mark Rawlins as an artist. He’s also a great illustrator, and I am a big fan of his work.

As an aside, whenever he re-releases his meggie t-shirt, get it. Or keep an eye out for collaborations, they’ve been Mark Eastman by Richard Meggie bowties, and I think handbags, but I digress.

Smallman is a documentary film about Richard’s father John Ambrose Kenwyn Rawlins, also known as JK Rawlins. It probably helps to know that Richard is an artist when you start watching the film, but not significantly so.

This is a beautifully made 10 minute or so documentary, that profiles a key moment in JK’s life and the lasting impact it had on him. It also details his most usual talent as the maker of miniatures.

It’s a biography, and a love story. Richard’s wife Mariel is the film maker, but she lets the relationship between Richard and his father take centre stage. Richard is shown handling his father’s work, photographs and letters throughout. I remember thinking, how lucky they were to have so much of his stuff. When Richard talks about his father, he calls him ‘daddy’. It is one of the many authentic elements in this heavily stylised film.

Chantel Esdelle’s score is wonderfully old, and Englishy, in a way that’s it true to the person being profiled, and the time in which much of the action discussed takes place.

I give this a 4 out of 5 stars, and will watch this again.

I watched Smallman: The World My Father Made on studioanansi.tv, click here to watch it yourself

Busshead on ILTV’s The Stew

Bahamas Carnival just ended and Machel Montano and Bunji Garlin were there. It was the first time the pair performed their soca hit Busshead outside of Trinidad. The duo were interviewed about their collaboration, and careers, on ILTV’s chat show The Stew.

They’ve (the show’s producers) posted the entire episode online, so you can fast forward to the 19.28 mark for the Bunji and Machel interviews.

 

That said, I ended up watching the entire programme because they spoke about the epic failure that was Fyre Festival. In a nutshell Fyre Festival was supposed to be an ultra-exclusive music festival on the Bahamian island of Great Exuma. It failed miserably, with lawsuits being filed, but of particular concern for us here in the Caribbean is where it would affect the tourist interest in our music festival, like Tobago Jazz. I like this article in Billboard for exploring those concerns nicely.

I liked the conversation on The Stew, because it’s a Bahamian chat show, so it was nice to hear their perspective on the fiasco.

And I’ve just noticed something, last post I shared Dionne Jackson-Miller’s All Access, today I shared The Stew. I wish we had more local and regional content on our televisions in Trinidad. That’s something I want to discuss, and will  probably do so in another post soon.

I’d never heard of The Stew before, but I know Aneka Stewart from her Insta-account @caytostyle. She’s fab. And I may start watching the show on the regular.

We’ll see.

Favourite Books

The was at the Bocas Lit Fest’s Voices From Inside event at the Port-of-Spain Prison. Debbie Jacob is a writer, who has several literary courses within the local prison system.

The Voices From Inside event was one of those really nice and hopeful events that make you believe in the potential of us all to do good things. It was a showcase of the prisoners’ poetry, and a reading from Dr. Baz Dresinger’s new book Incarcerated Nations. She had travelled all over, looking at our prison systems. Too many of them are holding cells for people, and do very little to reform or treat their ills. Too many are soul-destroying cages.

It was nice listening to the prisoners’ poetry. It was really nice to see how their fellow inmates responded to the work. One guy was clearly the prison saga boy, with shades and ting. I wish I was able to take a picture, but we had to hand in our cell phones to security.

It was also nice that for Baz’s book, they drafted local celebrities Kees Dieffenthaller, Machel Montano and Anya Ayoung-Chee to read excepts. Kees also performed, and Mohammed Muwakil, singer and well-known spoken word artist, opened the proceedings. It was a great showcase for the prisoners.

As a journalist I knew that I was going to talk to as many people as I could. Since the event was a Bocas Lit Fest event, I decided, let’s ask people what their favourite books were. So that’s what I did, and here are their answers.

Here’s a list of the books mentioned:

• Mohammed Muwakil: Seed to Harvest by Octavia Butler
• Anya Ayoung-Chee, Kees Dieffenthaller & Machel Montano: The Alchemist by Paulo Coehlo
• Kees Diefenthaller: The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran
• Machel Montano: The Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela, The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle
• Dr. Baz Dresinger: Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison

If you were to ask me that very same question, my books are The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, and Like Water For Chocolate by Laura Esquivel. And an honourable mention to Wine of Astonishment by Earl Lovelace, because I felt like I was buzzing while reading it. I was simply overcome with the sensation that it was meant to be read aloud.

Happy Reading!

Dancehall vs Soca

There’s a conversation that takes place in Jamaica about Dancehall versus Soca very regularly. And that conversation gets very heated around Jamaica Carnival.

It’s a hard conversation for me to listen to, because having lived in Jamaica – I studied at UWI, Mona – I hear the xenophobia in the comments. Too often when Jamaican talk about soca, there’s shade and there’s the blatant attacks. The Jamaican who likes Soca isn’t in the majority. And this upsets me, because Trinidad plays Dancehall like if it’s we ting on radio. Local DJs love to talk in pseudo-Jamaican accents on the radio, but where the music we love is getting made, they scorning Soca. And why shoudn’t they, when we don’t love it enough ourselves.

I think it’s worthy of note that Jamaicans don’t seem to be as threatened by or condescending of Rap and Hip Hop, as they are of Soca.

Having said that, I think that it is funny that if you switch the accents and location, this is a very similar to the conversations we’ve had about Dancehall. Not as heated, but I am both amused and shocked to see Soca being spoken of as though it is a threat to Dancehall. And that has me wondering if something else is at play.

I want you to look at the current affairs show All Angles. Dionne Jackson-Miller hosted a panel that included Dr. Kai Baratt, Marlon Campbell and Dr. Donna Hope. At some point, while watching it, I started to realise that the way Soca was introduced to Jamaica was completely at odds with it’s origins. And that disconnect is jarring. I find Jamaica Carnival’s positioning as an elitist festival very disturbing. Always have. While Trinidad Carnival has created the all-inclusive model that contributes to it’s increasingly upper class tone, because it’s “we ting”, our lower classes feel entitled to it in ways lower class Jamaicans do not. So while there are attempts to make Carnival “all-inclusive” with the view to exclude; the Jamettes, the Saga boys and the Bwa Men who created de ting have the real ownership of the mas, and will find a space, always.

 

I think that Jamaica needs to re-visit it’s relationship with Carnival. They have to find a way to make it true to them, in a positive way. And that positive has to be more than benefits it may add to it’s tourism model.

That said, I’m way more interested in Trinidad Carnival and fixing what ails us. And for me, that’s such a difficult question to answer, I guess because it’s emotional.

 

Bocas Lit Fest 2017

In the 7 years it’s been around, Bocas has grown from strength to strength. The annual literary festival has hosted some of the most successful and interesting writers, publishers and poets of Caribbean, and World literature. And because it’s in Trinidad, there’s a non-pretentiousness to the proceedings that may make your faves seem significantly more approachable.

I’ve always been a fan of Bocas. Especially as a formally voracious reader, who has slowed down significantly. I use Bocas to get me excited about reading again. And it has, not to my old standards, but I’m on the path to being a real reader.

Me in the audience for the Untold Jamaica panel featuring Kei Miller, author of Augustown, and Marcia Douglas, author of The Marvellous Equations of the Dread.

I also got to experience Bocas as a journalist. Just before the festival began, I spoke to Founding Director Marina Salandy Brown about the growing influence Caribbean writers is having worldwide. Perhaps, we should be looking towards developing Caribbean literary industry.

And as I mentioned in that piece, the Prime Minister was featured on special panel to discuss his autobiography From Mason Hall to Whitehall. A smart move from a festival that has just been recognised by Penguin Publishing as being one of the 20 best literary festivals in the world. It also allowed them to put the Prime Minister on the spot about his book tax.

It’s also a strategic move from the festival organisers. Because many good things are allowed to whither and die, because they can’t get the support they need. Bringing the Prime Minister, into the festival may help it win some support for it’s projects.

I’ll have more on Bocas, in another post. I may even share my book haul. See you soon.