When Terri Lyons led Karene Asche and Heather Mac Intosh in a clean sweep for women in the National Calypso Monarch competition on Carnival Thursday, it may have reminded many of Denyse Plummer’s 1988 boast that woman is boss. However, for those willing to go back two more years to …
Read More »Dark meat to the world! Terri Lyons takes Calypso throne via Prince Harry’s abdication
Dr Hollis ‘Chalkdust’ Liverpool suggested that everything happening in Trinidad and Tobago and elsewhere pales in significance to the ongoing ‘Murder Frenzy’—be it the Law Association’s fight to remove Chief Justice Ivor Archie, or whoever putting ‘dog in the curry’. But, last night, the nine-time Calypso Monarch champion was wrong. …
Read More »BC Lara’s Great GOAT Debate: Everyone loves a winner; why calypso shunned the Prince
On his first overseas tour as West Indies captain in 1998-99, Brian Lara took action on behalf of the players and forced the now late Pat Rousseau’s and the WICBC’s hand. Where, pray, were the calypsonians? Beginner and Maestro had already passed on but Sparrow and Kitchie were still with …
Read More »BC Lara’s Great GOAT Debate: Superblue’s slapdash Signal to Prince of POS; calypso let WI cricket down
“A man hit a ball in Antigua,” we all remember Superblue singing in 1995, “and it end up in Trinidad on the Promenade, Lara Promenade.” “The ball cross over rivers and seas,” he adds, “in the sky of the West Indies; the ball whistling through the trees like a joyful …
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 »London is the new capital of calypso; 21 year old bard’s Imagination takes him to crown
The fresh-faced Ronaldo London, 21, is Trinidad and Tobago’s new king of calypso, after he defeated 15 contestants to seize the 2019 Calypso Monarch crown last night at the Queen’s Park Savannah in Port of Spain. London, who sang last, won the favour of the judges and the audience with …
Read More »Who feels it, knows it! St Bernard’s pick for calypso crown and how local music can raise foreign exchange
I’m backing Joanne “Tigress” Rowley for Calypso Monarch 2019. Her story is real. Her music is good. And, yes, I had a ring side seat to her deciding on the song, Who Feels It, Knows It. Her rendition deals with depression and a mental health issue she dealt with after …
Read More »Thompson: Education, school days and 50 years of More Sparrow More!! (Part One)
“In the fullness of time, when Slinger Francisco’s massive oeuvre is unreservedly appreciated for its immense breadth and depth, rigorous scholars and casual calypso lovers alike will point to one special year, the Carnival season of 1969, when the Mighty Sparrow’s More Sparrow More!! album was released. “There had been …
Read More »Dear Editor: Will separating Groovy and Power revive International Soca Monarch?
Ian ‘Socapro’ Henry: “As soon as the current ISM organisers made the mistake of removing the separate Groovy Soca and Power Soca categories in 2016, the show has rapidly and steadily gone downhill in terms of excitement and audience attendance. This is no coincidence…” Martin Raymond: “Sorry, I totally disagree with …
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 »Dear Editor: “A sublime yet subtle poet […] who defied conformation”; Ode to Shadow
“He was a sublime yet subtle poet who danced to his own drum, who wove bass lines—allegedly from Hell, but so transportive as to refute that assertion—that underpinned, pulsed through and propelled each call that he made to his beloved people.” The following Letter to the Editor on the passing …
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