SAN­DRA L BLOOD

Award-win­ning chil­dren’s Car­ni­val band Spoilt Rot­ten Kids (SRK) will present Am­bakaila — de­scribed as a unique and im­mer­sive stage-in­spired por­tray­al — as its Car­ni­val of­fer­ing this year, fea­tur­ing nine sec­tions and mas­quer­aders as young as two.

Through Am­bakaila, the band will bring to life the work of icon­ic cul­tur­al per­son­al­i­ties, pay trib­ute to artistes who car­ried Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cul­ture to the world be­tween the 1950s and 1980s, and ho­n­our an­ces­tors whose choral and dance tra­di­tions helped shape the na­tion’s vi­brant cul­tur­al iden­ti­ty.

Am­bakaila was orig­i­nal­ly a cel­e­brat­ed stage pro­duc­tion by the late Aubrey Adams and the Trinidad The­atre Work­shop dur­ing the 1970s and ’80s. It was con­sid­ered ground­break­ing for its time, as it show­cased the cul­ture and tal­ent of Trinidad and To­ba­go across North and South Amer­i­ca and Eu­rope. Au­di­ences were treat­ed to per­for­mances of bélé, lim­bo, Arawak dance, steel­pan and ca­lyp­so — all pre­sent­ed as the­atri­cal spec­ta­cle.

SRK’s pre­sen­ta­tion con­tin­ues that lega­cy, po­si­tion­ing the band as ed­u­ca­tion­al, em­pow­er­ing and cul­tur­al­ly en­rich­ing.

The sec­tions in­clude La Pe­tite Mu­si­cale, fea­tur­ing girls aged four to six por­tray­ing Olive Walke through her famed Caribbean folk song Man­goes; Les En­fants, with girls aged four to six de­pict­ing Joyce Kir­ton as a Sara­ca dancer — a form she pi­o­neered af­ter its jour­ney from Africa to Car­ri­a­cou and Trinidad and To­ba­go; and Bélé Drum­mer Roll, where boys aged four to sev­en rep­re­sent the African drum, the heart­beat of the bélé dancer.

Arawak Na­tion fea­tures boys aged sev­en to nine ho­n­our­ing the First Peo­ples of Trinidad and To­ba­go, while Chantuelle show­cas­es girls aged sev­en to eight por­tray­ing Francine, a singer who per­formed in­ter­na­tion­al­ly with Am­bakaila. Lim­bo Like Me high­lights girls aged nine to ten pay­ing trib­ute to Ju­lia Ed­wards, the world’s first lim­bo am­bas­sador.

Old­er mas­quer­aders take cen­tre stage in Mid­night Rock, with boys aged 10 and over and girls aged 11 and over por­tray­ing the feared and tra­di­tion­al Mid­night Rob­ber char­ac­ter. La Belle Rosette fea­tures girls aged 10 ho­n­our­ing Beryl McBurnie, the fore­most pro­mot­er of Trinidad’s folk­lore and dance, who per­formed in­ter­na­tion­al­ly un­der that stage name and found­ed the Lit­tle Carib The­atre. Bring­ing up the rear are the youngest par­tic­i­pants — mixed two- and three-year-olds — in Dance the Bélé, por­tray­ing bélé dancers.

The band is led by Chris­tine Nunes, de­signed by Ter­ry-Ann Roach and mar­ket­ed by Eliz­a­beth In­niss-Williams, with mu­sic sup­plied by Au­dio Mas­ter.

Am­bakaila will make its com­pet­i­tive de­but at the Red Cross Chil­dren’s Car­ni­val on Feb­ru­ary 7, fol­lowed by the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion’s com­pe­ti­tions in St James on Feb­ru­ary 8 and down­town Port of Spain on Feb­ru­ary 15.

Avail­able:

T-shirts and lim­it­ed black SRK-brand­ed buck­et hats.

Re­quire­ments:

Faces must be ap­pro­pri­ate­ly made up.

Footwear:

Mid­night Rock – sil­ver

All oth­er sec­tions – gold

Reg­is­tra­tion and fur­ther in­for­ma­tion:

Email srk­car­ni­val@gmail.com