DAVID CUFFY

The au­di­ence was small, but the ca­lyp­sos were big at the Icons Ca­lyp­so Tent housed at the Am­bas­sador Ho­tel, Long Cir­cu­lar Road, St James, on Fri­day night. Man­aged by for­mer Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch Cro Cro (We­st­on Rawl­ins) for the past eight years, the tent is of­fer­ing pa­trons a pro­gramme packed with qual­i­ty songs, and ap­pears to be a fin­ish­ing school for new and un­der-ex­posed ca­lyp­so tal­ent. This is the con­clu­sion ar­rived at from a quick vis­it to the es­tab­lish­ment last Fri­day night un­der cir­cum­stances that did not al­low me to re­main and give a lis­ten to Cro Cro's 2012 of­fer­ing Say Some­thing for 2012, or An­dre Williams' Ex­tem­po Gov­ern­ment, or reign­ing Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Queen Heather McIn­tosh's One Gone.

The 15 pre-in­ter­mis­sion per­form­ers, how­ev­er, backed by the Icon Mae­stros, served pa­trons a di­gestible dish of ca­lyp­so com­po­si­tions that ran the gamut of so­cial and po­lit­i­cal com­men­tary, hu­mour, and par­ty. The play­bill opened with Cap­tain do­ing a pa­tri­ot­ic dit­ty ti­tled My Trinidad. He was fol­lowed by Dis­ci­ple who made a con­vinc­ing ar­gu­ment for the cap­i­tal city to be re­named Port La Trin­i­ty, and Ger­al­do giv­ing an in­sight in­to the Roy­al Wed­ding. It was Patch­es' Tri­ni Grapevine, though, that won the night's first en­core, no doubt for its sen­si­ble lyrics and dance­able melody. King Toe then told about his ex­pe­ri­ence with The Breath­a­lyz­er, Dic­ta­tor asked Who To Blame, and Ma­halia C sang about a State In Emer­gency.

Skeero then ad­vised mem­bers of the au­di­ence "doh hut yuh head" be­cause Look Ian An­tho­ny Com­ing, and Quick­sil­ver ap­peared in drag to tell about Ol­ga, whose danc­ing was "too vul­gar." In typ­i­cal style, Or­gan­is­er used a com­bi­na­tion of so­cial com­men­tary and hu­mour to lament his 20-year wait for a gov­ern­ment house in Wait Till We Call Yuh. Ran­do sang about those who were al­ways Watch­ing, and Car Wash of­fered his con­tri­bu­tion to the steel­pan in Mil­lion Dol­lar Mu­sic. Michelle Hen­ry ques­tioned the al­leged plot to as­sas­si­nate the Prime Min­is­ter and oth­er mem­bers of Cab­i­net in The Plot, and Cul­ture Ton­ic deemed all politi­cians back-stab­bers in a song ti­tled Ju­das. Tall­ish ap­pealed for peo­ple to Leave Joan Alone (for­mer cul­ture min­is­ter Joan Yuille-Williams), and Ran­do, in bring­ing the seg­ment to a close, in­formed and demon­strat­ed it was Time To Wine. Com­pe­tent­ly shar­ing show host du­ties were Ronald Prince and Llewellyn McIn­tosh (Short Pants).