De lizard run up she foot, An’ it disappear. Everybody still searchin’ everywhere. Wey de lizard, Teacher Mildred? …. …. …. …. De way she jolly an’ happy Ah sure de lizard must be ticklin’ she. There are many directors, screenwriters, DOPs, storyboard artists and cutting room assistants who would …
Read More »Vaneisa: The Gentle Observer—remembering the ‘Cultural Sprangalang’
The following column on Dennis ‘Sprangalang’ Hall, who passed away on Friday 2 October 2020, was first published in the Sunday Guardian on 30 January 1994: “Why you want to write about me?” he asks suspiciously on the telephone. “I doh like publicity. I’s just ah ordinary man making mih …
Read More »Thompson: More, Sparrow, More! Why Cutteridge won battle but Sparrow took the war
The following is the fourth and final instalment in Owen Thompson’s four-part series on the classic album, More Sparrow More!, by iconic calypsonian Slinger “Sparrow” Francisco: There are other equally telling avenues that allow us to arrive at meaning and afford us powerful glimpses into the unique quality of the …
Read More »Thompson: A lizard, school ma’am, Martinican mademoiselle and Sparrow’s sporting cock
The following is the third in Owen Thompson’s four-part series on the classic album, More Sparrow More!, by iconic calypsonian Slinger “Sparrow” Francisco: In Sa Sa Ay, Sparrow begins by making us all complicit eavesdroppers, inviting us both at the end of the first and the second stanzas to listen …
Read More »Thompson: Connecting Jean and Dinah to Sparrow’s unnamed pretty lil Martinican gyal
“[…] Sparrow took command of a cultural realm that touched a particularly sensitive chord, allowing for the message to be conveyed with extraordinary directness and clarity; the entire country sang along… Musically, and in terms of the procedural norms of an art form peculiar to T&T, Jean and Dinah was …
Read More »Gibbons’ new calypso drama: Voices from the ghetto to sing de chorus?
What, I asked myself, might a Part IV of “Sing de Chorus” look and sound like if the dramatist decided to write one? What quality material would he have to draw on? Would any such production be what a recent Express story about an upcoming concert called “an ode to …
Read More »Baldeosingh: Calypso and chutney music are not inherently sexist; and here’s why
“The fact is that almost all the calypsoes that are deemed sexist are calypsoes which, in one way or another, express the power of women over men. Growling Tiger’s “Money is King” (1935) says: ‘If you have money and things going nice/Any woman will call you honey and spice/If you …
Read More »Dear Editor: Authoritarian or authoritative? Are calypsoes more poetry than reliable history?
“Sparrow literally put words in Dr Williams’ mouth to great effect. “Since Dr Bird—thankfully!—is still alive, I am sure that he would be eager to tell journalists/researchers what statements in his calypso ‘Get to hell outta here’ and, for that matter, his other calypsoes were historically accurate and where he simply used …
Read More »Is Greatest Show on Earth not far from finished? Best’s 2017 Carnival post-mortem
A litany of whoa! But we jamming still! Bacchanal, synonym of and the default rhyme for Carnival, has been part and parcel of the national festival for donkey’s years and controversy and comess have been its consistent companions. But this year was ‘diss’ year; everywhere you looked in 2017, it was disaffection, …
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