A video trib­ute will be paid to the late mas­man ex­tra­or­di­naire Ger­al­do Vieira Sr by his son Ger­al­do Vieira Jr, at the C2k13 edi­tion of Big Fri­day on Feb­ru­ary 8, at Queen's Park Sa­van­nah, Port-of-Spain.

Dur­ing his ca­reer, his de­signs like De­mon Man­tis and Mys­tic Dawn won the King of Car­ni­val ti­tle nine times, and for three con­sec­u­tive years from 1981. He in­tro­duced the use of py­rotech­nics in cos­tumes in 1999 and spe­cial ef­fects like fire­works.

Apart from the pageantry, Big Fri­day will be sup­port­ed by per­form­ers from the Na­tion­al Dance Acad­e­my, Mar­cia Charles Dance Troupe and the Na­tion­al Steel Or­ches­tra. Artistes in­clud­ing Bun­ji Gar­lin, Fay-Ann Lyons, David Rud­der, Denyse Plum­mer and Kees Di­ef­fen­thaller will per­form. Ca­lyp­so greats Plum­mer and the King Rud­der will pro­vide piv­otal en­er­gy to the show.

Mean­while, the pre­lim­i­nary round has been set for Jan­u­ary 31. The au­di­ence will be en­cour­aged to vote for "Peo­ple's Choice for Mas King, Mas Queen and Mas Ju­nior" crowns. In a unique twist to the show, both the ju­niors and se­niors would be in full com­pe­ti­tion that night with the ac­tu­al crown­ing of the win­ners tak­ing place at the end of the pro­gramme.

The prizes have been in­creased sig­nif­i­cant­ly to $844,000 or a 64 per cent in­crease.

The se­nior Kings and Queens will re­ceive: 1st place–$250,000, 2nd place–$170,000 and 3rd place–$120,000.

More in­fo: Tick­ets are avail­able at the Queen's Park Sa­van­nah, Port-of-Spain, and at the tick­et booth NC­BA of­fices at Port-of-Spain and San Fer­nan­do.Cost: $100 Gen­er­al and $300 VIP.www.nc­batt.com for more in­fo.