Michelle Loubon

All roads lead to Ari­ma for the semi­fi­nals of the Play Whe In­ter­na­tion­al Pow­er So­ca Monarch and Dig­i­cel In­ter­na­tion­al Groovy So­ca Monarch com­pe­ti­tions to­day at the Ari­ma Velo­drome. Guardian Me­dia Ltd is its of­fi­cial spon­sor. So­ca artistes will be seek­ing to de­throne 2012 Pow­er/Groovy cham­pi­on Machel Mon­tano on Car­ni­val Fri­day.

Chair­man of Caribbean Pres­tige Foun­da­tion (CPF) William Munro says 60 of the best artistes will en­gage in bois bataille. How­ev­er so­ca cou­ple Bun­ji Gar­lin (Ian Al­varez) and Fay-Ann Lyons-Al­varez have pulled out due to is­sues with their con­tracts.

Munro said, "It's go­ing to be an ex­cit­ing com­pe­ti­tion. We have 60 of the best. It's like a fi­nals in a semi­fi­nals. The artistes and the pub­lic are ex­cit­ed. May the best go for­ward. The pub­lic will ex­pect a treat to­day. It is go­ing to be Fan­tas­tic Fri­day when we cel­e­brate our 21st an­niver­sary (Feb­ru­ary 8)." He al­so paid ku­dos to artistes who failed to make the semi­fi­nals.

"We have a high cal­i­bre of artistes. We have big names like Neil Iw­er, Blaxx and De­stra Gar­cia. Su­perblue is back. We have Shur­wayne Win­ches­ter, Megan Wal­dron and Prophet Ben­jamin Samuel. It's go­ing to be a great com­pe­ti­tion. To those who did not give up, I say con­tin­ue to labour in the vine­yard," said Munro. Pop­u­lar Caribbean per­form­ers like Grena­da's Wilt 'Tal­pree' Cam­bridge will al­so at­tempt to woo the judges.