Two years af­ter the last lo­cal Car­ni­val, scores of Trinidad and To­ba­go's en­ter­tain­ers, mas pro­duc­ers and par­ty lovers be­gin five days of cel­e­bra­tions in Can­cun, Mex­i­co to­day for what has been la­belled Melé Des­ti­na­tions.

The event will be Machel Mon­tano's re­turn to the Car­ni­val are­na for the first time since 2020, when he end­ed his Machel Mon­day se­ries of con­certs with The Wed­ding.

Events ceased soon af­ter with the on­set of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic and al­though some artistes found op­por­tu­ni­ties abroad, Mon­tano has kept pub­lic ap­pear­ances to the very bare min­i­mal, the most no­table be­ing his per­for­mance of a few songs at the 2022 Ma­haShiv­ara­tri cel­e­bra­tions in In­dia in March.

He is list­ed for two big per­for­mances with his team, The Monk Band, at the Can­cun events.

De­stra Gar­cia, Patrice Roberts, Ker­win Dubois, Farmer Nap­py, Skin­ny Fab­u­lous, Lyrikal, Voice, Viking Ding Dong, Prob­lem Child and Bee­nie Man are al­so among the line-up of en­ter­tain­ers for the Car­ni­val events in Mex­i­co.

The events are be­ing held at the Moon Palace Re­sort from April 28 to May 2.

They will al­so show­case an A-list of lo­cal and re­gion­al DJs, in­clud­ing Travis World, Lur­bz, Lord Hype, Pri­vate Ryan and Aaron Fin­gal.

The venue for some of the Mele Destinations events.

Instagram: meledestinations

The first day will fea­ture a par­ty called Bi­en­venidos a Melé! in which Mon­tano will per­form his first 20 years of mu­sic, in a show called HITS - The Ear­ly Days, fol­lowed by sev­er­al days of par­ties and mas, in­clud­ing Mas in Mex­i­co host­ed by pre­mier Car­ni­val band TRIBE on Day 3.

Oth­er events in­clude Hy­drate FOAM spon­sored by Carib, Ig­nite GLOW spon­sored by An­gos­tu­ra White Oak, a Las Lap Car­ni­val Cooldown, 40 Years A LEG­END fea­tur­ing Machel Mon­tano per­form­ing his lat­est hits, and a So­ca VS Dance­hall Aqua Spin.

Melé was ini­tial de­signed to be a cruise as part of a col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween TRIBE and Mon­tano, but the cruise was post­poned and changed in­to the cur­rent event.

The venue is an all-in­clu­sive re­sort in Mex­i­co of­fer­ing sig­na­ture ameni­ties, lux­u­ri­ous ac­com­mo­da­tions, 24-hour room ser­vice, gourmet din­ing, and top-shelf drinks among nu­mer­ous oth­er at­trac­tions.

Ac­cord­ing to Mon­tano, though the cruise in­dus­try is tak­ing the nec­es­sary steps to nav­i­gate a way for­ward for the fu­ture, cruis­ing “will be ready for all the melé we in­tend to cause on the high seas at a lat­er time”.

Af­ter months of con­sid­er­a­tion, the Melé team made the de­ci­sion to move “from ship to shore,” with Moon Palace Re­sort, Can­cun, as their home for five days and four nights.

Mele organisers following a meeting at the Moon Palace Resort in Cancun, Mexico.

Instagram: @meledestinations

When asked about the im­pact of COVID-19 and the shift from ship to shore, Dean Ackin, CEO of TRIBE spoke about the mas­sive changes the Events and En­ter­tain­ment in­dus­try has un­der­gone over the last 18 months.

He main­tained that the key to the con­ti­nu­ity and longevi­ty of any brand is in­no­va­tion.

“The TRIBE brand is no stranger to in­no­v­a­tive con­cepts hav­ing in­tro­duced all-in­clu­sive mas to T&T Car­ni­val some 16 years ago” Ackin stat­ed.

Source: The quotes from Machel Mon­tano and Dean Akin used in this ar­ti­cle were sourced from a press re­lease is­sued by Melé Des­ti­na­tions.