Pe­ter Ray Blood

It's fi­nal­ly ar­rived; Car­ni­val 2014. This week­end is chock-full with fi­nals for ca­lyp­so, so­ca, pan and mas.

Ar­guably the biggest and most elab­o­rate event in the fes­ti­val, the Dig­i­cel In­ter­na­tion­al Groovy So­ca Monarch and Play Whe In­ter­na­tion­al Pow­er So­ca Monarch fi­nals take place tonight at the Hase­ly Craw­ford Sta­di­um, Port-of-Spain at 9 o'clock.

Al­so on the billing are the Carib Break­out Artiste of the Year, be­tween T&T's Er­phaan Alves and Grena­da's Mr Kil­la; and, the NL­CB Trib­ute to the Clas­sics, fea­tur­ing Ru­pee of Bar­ba­dos and T&T's Scrunter.

All told, there are 23 artistes con­test­ing the two cat­e­gories of the So­ca Monarch com­pe­ti­tion. In ad­di­tion, the event will be at­tend­ed by Hol­ly­wood red car­pet hit-mak­ers Boris Kod­joe, Nicole Ari Park­er, An­tho­ny An­der­son, Tahiry Jose and Damien Dante Wayans. That's not all, al­so stars in their own right will be guest artistes Soul Train Award win­ner Bun­ji Gar­lin, Fay-Ann Lyons and the Asy­lum Vikings Band, and Kes the Band.

Tonight is al­so Big Fri­day in the Queen's Park Sa­van­nah, Port-of-Spain, at 7 pm. Host­ed by the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion (NCC) and the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Bands As­so­ci­a­tion (NC­BA), it is the fi­nals of the King and Queen of Car­ni­val com­pe­ti­tions. Twen­ty kings and queens have qual­i­fied to face the judges on a pro­gramme which al­so in­cludes a num­ber of guest artistes.

From 7 am to­mor­row, the Re­pub­lic Bank Chil­dren's Pa­rade of the Bands will be held, be­gin­ning at Adam Smith Square, Wood­brook and go­ing to the Queen's Park Sa­van­nah, Port-of-Spain. There is some con­tro­ver­sy in this event over the change of route for the pa­rade from the in­ner city to the west­ern sub­urbs. Some band­lead­ers have stat­ed that they will boy­cott the pa­rade be­cause of this change.

To­mor­row night sees the stag­ing of the Na­tion­al­Panora­ma fi­nals for medi­um and large con­ven­tion­al steel or­ches­tras. Among the large bands, the de­fend­ing cham­pi­on is Petrotrin Phase II Pan Groove and it is stout­ly chal­lenged by Neal & Massy Trinidad All Stars, Re­pub­lic Bank Ex­o­dus, bpTT Rene­gades and Wit­co Des­per­a­does.

The 2014 Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch fi­nal has re­turned to Car­ni­val Sun­day, as an el­e­ment of Di­manche Gras. A dozen ca­lyp­so­ni­ans, each singing two songs, are all set to chal­lenge de­fend­ing monarch Pink Pan­ther (Er­ic Tay­lor) for the mil­lion-dol­lar first prize.

This com­pe­ti­tion is wide open and it is ex­treme­ly dif­fi­cult to chose a clear-cut win­ner, if on­ly be­cause nei­ther judges or the pub­lic knows what sec­ond song the con­tes­tants will per­form.

Peo­ple are say­ing that if Mr Shak has a sec­ond dit­ty that is as strong as Bois, the ca­lyp­so he im­pressed Skin­ner Park with last Sat­ur­day, at the semi­fi­nals, he would be the new monarch.

Four for­mer na­tion­al mon­archs–Pink Pan­ther, Cro Cro, Kurt Allen, Chalk­dust–are in the fi­nal, as well as the 50th An­niver­sary of In­de­pen­dence Monarch (Chucky) and for­mer Young Kings monarch Bri­an Lon­don.

Or­der of ap­pear­ance

Dig­i­cel In­ter­na­tion­al Groovy So­ca fi­nal­ists:

1. Ravi B Bread

2. Mr Fa­mous Play More Lo­cal

3. Er­phaan Alves Con­ta­gious

4. Skin­ny Fab­u­lous Be­hav­ing the Worst

5. Denise "Saucy Wow" Bel­fon Chuku Chuku

6. Big­gie Irie Need A Rhythm

7. De­stra Gar­cia First Time

8. Tall­pree Jab Na­tion

9. Farmer Nap­py Big Peo­ple Par­ty

10. Cas­si Man In Yuh House

11. Ker­win Du Bois Too Re­al

12. Machel Mon­tano Hap­pi­est Man Alive

Play Whe In­ter­na­tion­al Pow­er So­ca Monarch fi­nal­ists:

1. Ann-G We Love Car­ni­val

2. Snakey Dhoti Short

3. Na­dia Bat­son Rat­ed R

4. Patrice Roberts Fet­ing Di Most

5. Su­perBlue Car­ni­val YoYo

6. Iw­er George Ma­ma Oye

7. Lyrikal Lock­down

8. De­von Matthews Lev­el It

9. De­stra Gar­cia Mash Up

10. Mr Kil­la Rol­ly Pol­ly

11. Machel Mon­tano Min­istry of Road

King & Queen of Car­ni­val

Kings

1. Quars Al Sahraa Desert Sting – Wade Madray – 423

2. Zanzik­il, Lord of Chaos – Cur­tis Eu­stace

3. Mon­key Know What Tree to Climb – Ted Eu­stace

4. Na­gin Sa­phera – The Ser­pent Charmer – Ravi Lakhan

5. De Tor­na­do – Ronald Blaize

6. Af­ter Earth – Glenn Dave Lakhan

7. Madi­ba (The Heart of a War­rior) – Zi­nool Moah­mmed

8. What Lies Be­neath – Fareid Car­val­ho

9. Scor­pi­on King – Earl Beck­les

10. Po­sei­don Comin' – Clyde Bas­combe

Queens

1. We Beat Pan Mu­sic – Glo­ria Dalls­ingh

2. High Noon on the Co­manchero Sa­cred Grounds – Raevon Ather­ton

3. In­deera (Moth­er of In­dia) – De­ne­sha Jen­nings

4. Bur­ro­keet Woman – Kay Ma­son

5. African Drum Dancer – Lau­ra Ram­per­sad

6. War­rior of Fire: Rise of the Mys­tic Phoenix – Al­en­dra Bai­ley

7. Za­ma­ra, Mi­rage of the Oa­sis – Pe­o­la Marchan

8. The Un­usu­al Beau­ty – Cher­ry-Ann Patrice Valere

9. Re­frac­tion: A Phe­nom­e­non of Light – Tami­ka George

10. Hera, Bonds of Uni­ty – Tra­cell Fred­er­ick

Na­tion­al Panora­ma Fi­nals

Medi­um Bands:

�2Melo­di­ans

�2Carib Dix­ieland

�2NGC Steel

Xplo­sion

�2Pan El­ders

�2Val­ley Harps

�2Petrotrin

Katzen­jam­mers

�2NGC Cou­va

Joy­lan­ders

�2Courts Sound Spe­cial­ists of Laven­tille

�2Ari­ma An­gel Harps

�2NL­CB Buc­cooneers

Large Bands

�2CAL In­vaders

�2NL­CB Fon­claire

�2NGC La Brea

Nightin­gales

�2Wit­co

Des­per­a­does

�2T&TEC Trop­i­cal

An­gel Harps

�2Re­pub­lic Bank

Ex­o­dus

�2PCS Ni­tro­gen

Sil­ver Stars

�2Skif­fle

�2Neal & Massy

Trinidad All Stars

�2Petrotrin Phase

II Pan Groove

�2bpTT Rene­gades

Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch

Pink Pan­ther

Cro Cro

Queen Vic­to­ria

Mis­tah Shak

Body­guard

Chucky

In­cred­i­ble My­ron B

Kurt Allen

Chalk­dust

Skatie

Bri­an Lon­don

Alana Sinette