Sto­ry and pho­tos

by Nigel Teles­ford

Reign­ing Ca­lyp­so Monarch Machel Mon­tano start­ed his 2025 Car­ni­val cam­paign with a high-en­er­gy per­for­mance for a char­i­ta­ble cause last Fri­day night, as he ‘flew’ down from the Pi­ar­co In­ter­na­tion­al Air­port for Han­nah Janourah’s fundrais­ing event at Mille Fleurs, Queens Park West.

Mon­tano’s first of­fi­cial con­cert per­for­mance in more than two years will take place Fri­day at the Mega con­cert event to be held at the Bri­an Lara Crick­et Acad­e­my, but the vet­er­an en­ter­tain­er en­joyed a good warm-up ses­sion among the busi­ness elite as­sem­bled at the his­toric and scenic venue in Port-of-Spain last Fri­day.

With a $1,500 price tag per per­son and pro­ceeds go­ing to peo­ple with dis­abil­i­ties for wheel­chairs and health­care, the fundrais­er was well-sup­port­ed by mem­bers of gov­ern­ment, pri­vate sec­tor and cor­po­rate Trinidad.

Mon­tano was the high­light of the night’s ac­tion, fol­low­ing en­gag­ing per­for­mances from the T&T Po­lice Ser­vice Steel Or­ches­tra to open and close, pop­u­lar en­ter­tain­er, en­tre­pre­neur, and tele­vi­sion pro­duc­er/pre­sen­ter Jerome “Rome” Pre­cil­la, and Road March King Mi­cal Te­ja.

Brian Morris, Destra Garcia, Wendell Constantine and Hannah Janoura

Nigel Telesford

The venue was en­hanced with decor and de­sign by Bri­an Mac­Far­lane and sump­tu­ous dish­es and desserts cour­tesy of Mona Hadeed of Boomerang Cater­ers.

MC Wen­dell Con­stan­tine had no trou­ble nar­rat­ing the evening and ush­er­ing the as­sem­bly in­to the Car­ni­val ac­tion ear­ly with his pow­er­ful and pre­cise vo­cal de­liv­ery. De­mand­ing crowd in­ter­ac­tions, lead­ing con­ga lines and nar­rat­ing door prize pre­sen­ta­tions, Con­stan­tine suc­cess­ful­ly and ef­fi­cient­ly orat­ed the spir­it of the oc­ca­sion, which even con­vinced So­ca Queen De­stra Gar­cia to step out in­to the light for some brief mo­ments—all for a no­ble and wor­thy cause.

Ar­riv­ing clos­er to the end, Mon­tano ex­tend­ed his set gra­cious­ly to ac­com­mo­date the en­er­gy of the gath­er­ing, but would not cater to re­quests, say­ing with a smile:

“Y’all will have to come to Mega down south next Fri­day for that! I just came off a plane and came straight here, and this is for char­i­ty, so we are giv­ing back to those in need al­ready,” he told the crowd.

“Be­lieve it or not, I am 50 now yuh know... so I can’t put out too much here tonight, but for Han­nah Janoura, of course, we have all an­swered the call and we all know how much she has done and con­tin­ues to do for the peo­ple, so let’s cel­e­brate her tonight as well.”

Michael Quamina, Christian Mouttet and Brian Lara have a chat during the action at Hannah Janoura’s fundraiser

Nigel Telesford

The belle of the ball, Han­nah Janoura was ever-present through­out the night, min­gling, chat­ting and tak­ing pho­tos and self­ies with guests, greet­ing dig­ni­taries and busi­ness­men alike and lead­ing the charge for­ward to fill the space in front of the stage once the live per­for­mances be­gan with “Rome”.

Crick­et leg­end Bri­an Lara even coaxed her in­to a dance on­stage as Mon­tano lift­ed all hands and voic­es in song, pro­mot­ing his Road March-favoured “Pardy” re­lease, along­side crowd favourites, bring­ing the cur­tains down on a fab­u­lous night amidst the Mag­nif­i­cent Sev­en.

Blue Waters CEO Dominic Hadeed, centre, takes a photo with his family, from left, Genevierve, Victoria, Bernard, Alexa and Alianne Hadeed

Nigel Telesford

Machel’s mother, Elizabeth Montano, left, takes a photo with Signwave director, Colin Mitchell and First Citizens Bank chairman, Anthony Smart

Nigel Telesford