Chaka Khan celebrates mothers

Chaka Khan may be referred to as the Queen of Funk, but this weekend patrons at the Every Woman concert at the Queen’s Park Savannah on Saturday night got to see a whole different side of her. Midway during her performance of her hit song, Through The Fire, she stopped to give a testimony about her rebellious past. She described herself as a former “bad girl”. “I was a real bad, bad, bad, bad girl,” she confessed, as she spoke of her addiction to cocaine and the power it had over her. Becoming emotional, she said it was a phone call from her seven-year–old daughter that brought her back to her senses. “I was getting high one night and I usually would not answer the phone when I’m high but I did that night,” she said.

Khan said her daughter on the other end begging her to come home. She immediately stopped what she was doing and went to see her daughter who at the time was staying with her (Khan’s) mother. “To get to my kids, I had to go through my mother, but my mom told me before I could get to them, I needed to fall on my knees and have a talk with Jesus.” Khan said she did just that. “I had a talk with Jesus and I asked Him to cut me loose from my addiction and He did. God is so good and worthy to be praised...Hallelujah! “Listen, if you need anything just ask Jesus, that’s what He is there for. If he could save me, I know he could do the same for you,” she preached.

Hitting the high notes
Earlier, a youthful and slim Chaka Khan, dressed in a black blouse with matching shorts, black stockings and a sheer black full length jacket, took to the stage shortly after 11 pm. Wasting no time, the Grammy Award winner began effortlessly hitting the high notes with songs like, I Want, What You Gonna Do for Me, and I Love You. She dedicated I’m a Woman in a Man’s World to the mothers in the audience. “This is a women’s day...We are celebrating all mothers. We are the only ones who can bring it together and make sense of this mess,” Khan said. Khan said her week in T&T was very relaxing, “something like a paradise”. She also took time out to sing Happy Birthday to two of her backup singers, Kerry and Tiffany, before performing Pack My Bags, which she described as her “baby daddy” song. Khan took the audience down memory lane as she belted, Tell Me Something Good, I Wanna Be With You, Sweet Thing and several other chart-toppers, to which the audience sang along.
There was also a jazz interlude with a solo performance by her guitarist, who is also her musical director, saxophonist and keyboardist. Khan ended her performance with the anthem, Every Woman. But just as patrons began walking out of the venue she reappeared on stage with soca king Machel Montano who tried to extempo for the queen of funk.
Montano thanked Khan for her visit to T&T and offered supporting vocals to her as she sang Ain’t Nobody, before leaving the stage for a final time.

A Trini thing
The concert, organised by Nu Wave Entertainment began nearly an hour late, much to the displeasure of patrons. They were, however, appeased when T&T’s soca artiste Megan Walrond opened the show with the national anthem and delivered a beautiful rendition of Kerwin Dubois’ Bacchnalist, R&B style. The SASS lead singer ended her performance with Alive by Celine Dion. Backed by Wayne Bruno and Rapid Response, David Rudder took to the stage moments later, captivating the crowd for nearly one hour with his calypso hits. His repertoire included, Oil and Music, Laventille, De Hammer, Dust in dey Face, Madness, Trini to De Bone and High Mas, among others. Rudder also took time out to interact with a tourist from Russia who attended the show, engaging them in crash course in speaking Trini. “Trinis like to add the letter ‘s’ to the ending of everything. Down here we doh say cutlery we say cutleries. We doh say gimme a coke, we say cokes and sometimes we even add ‘s’ to breakfast,” the calypso icon said. He made his way off the stage and into the crowd for his last song, High Mas, with patrons leaving their seats to join him, some hugging the singer while others took photos with him.