KRISTY RAM­NAR­INE

Kristy.ram­nar­ine@cnc3.co.tt

Ali­cia Jag­gas­sar is known as the first la­dy of Parang.

The Pres­i­dent of the Na­tion­al Parang As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T (NPATT), a tal­ent­ed singer and song­writer whose dis­tinc­tive voice has won many ac­co­lades, spends the en­tire year wait­ing for her favourite time of year – Christ­mas.

While the weeks lead­ing up to De­cem­ber 25 are packed with ad­min­is­ter­ing end-of-term tests to her stu­dents, re­hearsals with her band Los Alum­nos De San Juan and per­for­mances, fam­i­ly time is giv­en its pri­or­i­ty.

“My fam­i­ly sees Christ­mas as a time to gath­er and share laugh­ter and songs, cel­e­brat­ing the birth of Je­sus Christ,” she said.

“It is that one time when all my fam­i­ly mem­bers would come to­geth­er and share gifts and meals with each oth­er to take home es­pe­cial­ly me who does not cook.”

Jag­gas­sar’s high­light is watch­ing her moth­er’s face when she wakes up Christ­mas morn­ing and sees her en­tire home trans­formed.

“San­ta’s Elves passed”, she would say to her moth­er look­ing out for her proud smile.

Three days be­fore Christ­mas Jag­gas­sar starts prepar­ing her home with fam­i­ly to dec­o­rate on Christ­mas Eve.

“It is all about go­ing to parang and then home to clean,” she ex­plained. ”Christ­mas Eve I would do last-minute shop­ping for dec­o­ra­tions alone noth­ing more. I would then re­turn home to con­tin­ue the trans­for­ma­tion.”

An­nu­al­ly, the fam­i­ly cel­e­brates her par­ents’ an­niver­sary on De­cem­ber 27 with more parang, food and danc­ing.

“This year with the pass­ing of my fa­ther we are not hav­ing that cel­e­bra­tion,” she said. “My broth­er would now car­ry on the tra­di­tion.”

Jag­gas­sar lost her hus­band Wayne Jagdeo, an in­te­gral mem­ber of Los Alum­nos de San Juan, to can­cer in 2021.

Christ­mas 2020 was a tough year for the parang queen who weath­ered the storms of forced rules on the en­ter­tain­ment in­dus­try as a re­sult of the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic and her late hus­band’s can­cer di­ag­no­sis.

The roller-coast­er of emo­tions set the per­former back for a bit.

Jag­gas­sar’s cop­ing mech­a­nism was pen­ning her emo­tions on pa­per and cre­at­ing mu­sic. In 2022, she launched her so­lo ca­reer and al­bum at her con­cert Dare to be Me.

“Dur­ing that time was dif­fi­cult, there were many times I sat and could not breathe, the tears just flowed,” she re­called. “I de­cid­ed to ex­press every­thing I felt through mu­sic.”

Ja­gas­sar con­tin­ues to lead Los Alum­nos de San Juan which in­cludes six of her fam­i­ly mem­bers.

“I al­so have some of my nieces and nephews in school groups,” she said. “I con­sid­er all my mem­bers as fam­i­ly.”

She is con­tent­ed know­ing that the art form has grown since her bap­tism in­to parang mu­sic some 36 years ago.

“What ex­cites me the most is the cel­e­bra­tion of the birth of Je­sus Christ,” she said. “Singing this sto­ry to many per­sons and watch­ing the joy on their faces as a re­flec­tion of the way the parang mu­sic makes them feel.

“I am dri­ven by my love for God and his peo­ple, es­pe­cial­ly chil­dren. I love mak­ing peo­ple hap­py and serv­ing.”

Her Christ­mas wish is to see Parang on all ma­jor plat­forms as an in­te­gral part of all our cel­e­bra­tions.

“I would like to see parang in all schools spark­ing a love for the Span­ish lan­guage and in­ter­est in the his­to­ry of this beau­ti­ful mu­si­cal art form,” she said. “I want to see all par­ran­deros unit­ed as one cel­e­brat­ing an art form that has served us for many gen­er­a­tions.

“I want to see a greater lev­el of re­spect for our art form and more sup­port and recog­ni­tion for the pos­i­tive im­pact this genre has on our cit­i­zens and more so our youths.

“Parang as an all year round mu­sic from Jan­u­ary to De­cem­ber.”

The pri­ma­ry school teacher bal­ances her dai­ly job with re­hearsals and per­for­mances.

“I do not know how I man­age as many days I scream,” she chuck­led. “I re­main in prayer and I am as­sist­ed by my fam­i­ly mem­bers and band mem­bers. I am sur­round­ed by friends and ded­i­cat­ed per­son­nel who form a part of my sup­port sys­tem.”

Her Christ­mas mes­sage: “Re­mem­ber the rea­son for the sea­son and fill your heart with the peace and joy that the birth of Je­sus Christ has brought to us. Choose to love, choose to for­give. Christ­mas bless­ings to all.”