IN­NIS FRAN­CIS

Free­lance Cor­re­spon­dent

At 20 years old, Nao­mi Sin­nette has be­come the sec­ond youngest Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Queen.

The youngest was Ab­bi Black­man, who won the com­pe­ti­tion at just age 14.

Sin­nette beat a field of 17 com­peti­tors to be crowned the 38th Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Queen for the show, which was host­ed by the Na­tion­al Women’s Ac­tion Com­mit­tee (NWAC) at Queen’s Hall, St Ann’s, on Sun­da.

En­ter­ing the com­pe­ti­tion for the sec­ond time, Sin­nette per­formed a piece ti­tled Them Ad­vi­sors, a so­cial com­men­tary on mar­ried re­la­tion­ships fraught by love and abuse.

Sin­nette said she re­cent­ly com­plet­ed her A’Lev­els at the New But­ler As­so­ciate Col­lege in Port-of-Spain and is keen­ly an­tic­i­pat­ing cours­es in Beau­ty Cul­ture and Mu­sic at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies.

She sings out of the Di­va’s Ca­lyp­so Cabaret In­ter­na­tion­al.

De­spite her ef­forts last year, she placed sixth in the com­pe­ti­tion. She ad­mit­ted that she ex­pe­ri­enced some dif­fi­cul­ties back­stage and tech­ni­cal set­backs and be­came flus­tered. How­ev­er, she said she re­gained con­fi­dence af­ter her per­for­mance, when sev­er­al peo­ple back­stage praised her for a good de­liv­ery of her pre­sen­ta­tion.

Sin­nette said she felt con­fi­dent that she would be in the top three, but was sur­prised when was an­nounced the win­ner.

“I was shocked and ex­cit­ed at the same time when I heard I won. I would say al­ways stay con­sis­tent, love what you do de­spite the dis­ap­point­ments, keep go­ing, and al­ways have a strong team to sup­port you,” Sin­nette said.

Each year, or­gan­is­ers of the show ho­n­our some­one in the art form.

In­de­pen­dent Sen­a­tor Suni­ty Ma­haraj an­nounced that this year’s hon­oree, El­la An­dall, would re­ceive a life achieve­ment plaque and cheque.

Ma­haraj de­scribed An­dall as a chantwell ex­tra­or­di­naire who took the spir­i­tu­al­i­ty of Afro/Caribbean Or­isha mu­sic to every cor­ner of the world. An­dall was not present be­cause she was said to be “un­der the weath­er.”

Ma­haraj said An­dall’s com­po­si­tions have giv­en so many peo­ple strength and re­silience over time. How­ev­er, she said some top­ics are still as preva­lent to­day as it was in 1935.

“In a coun­try of nine-day won­ders and in the 38th year, to have 38 com­pe­ti­tions over a long du­ra­tion is a tour de force. It is no easy ef­fort to sus­tain such work over such a pe­ri­od and to be here to­day in an­oth­er cen­tu­ry, is cause for cel­e­bra­tions. There is no such thing as re­tire­ment in ca­lyp­so, you are in the com­pe­ti­tion, you get in­to the Gayelle and you show the new­com­ers what you are made of and they show you what they have to bring,” Ma­haraj said.

She called on the au­thor­i­ties to care­ful­ly con­sid­er re­nam­ing Nel­son Street af­ter La­dy Trinidad, in recog­ni­tion of the first woman in ca­lyp­so.

The Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so King com­pe­ti­tion will take place at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah on Jan­u­ary 30.