Nass­er Khan

Car­ni­val 2019 is in the air, in the hearts, minds, and pock­ets of many a Trini­bag­on­ian…and ac­cord­ing to Su­perblue, “Arts and cul­ture on pa­rade, Car­ni­val splen­dour in a rag brigade…Is Car­ni­val.”

While we rev­el in the Car­ni­val splen­dour let's re­flect on those who have pi­o­neered us from the tra­di­tion­al ca­lyp­so art form to the var­i­ous gen­res of ca­lyp­so (pow­er so­ca, chut­ney so­ca, groovy so­ca, rap­so, rag­ga so­ca, jamoo); from tra­di­tion­al mas­querad­ing to biki­ni and beads to biki­ni and feath­ers mas; and from the tam­boo bam­boo and skin drums to the steel­pan, the on­ly acoustic in­stru­ment in­vent­ed in the 20th cen­tu­ry.

Harold “Sal­ly” Salde­nah (1925-1985) had a deep love of his­to­ry and in­tense­ly re­searched his por­tray­als to en­sure that he was able to re-cre­ate the mo­ments in time in his­to­ry. These his­tor­i­cal epics are renowned for the mag­nif­i­cence, colour and splen­dour of their cos­tumes. Salden­ha copped six Band-of-the-Year ti­tles (1955, 1956, 1958, 1964, 1965, 1968) be­fore mov­ing to Cana­da in 1977 where he as­sist­ed his son Louis with his Toron­to's Carib­ana bands. Fol­low­ing that hia­tus, he re­turned to Trinidad in 1983 to pro­duce the last three of his bands.

George Bai­ley (1935-1970). Car­ni­val 2010 saw a re­turn of the spir­it of the ge­nius of the late George “Sir George” Bai­ley, via the Stephen Derek and As­so­ciates pro­duced band “Call that George”, a 15-sec­tion pre­sen­ta­tion, each named and de­signed af­ter bands pro­duced by Bai­ley from 1956 un­til his un­time­ly death in 1970. “Sir George”, so nick­named due to his per­son­al­i­ty and the high stan­dard of his art, al­so cap­tured six “Band of the Year” ti­tles (1957, 1959, 1960, 1961, 1962,1969). He was the first to cap­ture a beaver-trick of Band of the Year ti­tles.

Irvin “Mac” McWilliams (1920-2007). Dur­ing his band-pro­duc­ing years from 1956 to 1988 he pro­vid­ed T&T with some 32 spec­tac­u­lar pre­sen­ta­tions many of which were based on themes of T&T, its his­to­ry and its cul­ture. The first of such lo­cal-themed bands was in 1961 Hail La Tri­nite and the last Stay up Trin­ba­go in 1988. He cap­tures three Band of the Year Ti­tles in 1971, 1972 and 1978..

Pow­er cou­ples of Mas, Ed­mund (1923-2017)/Lil Hart (1931-1991) and Stephen (1921-2014/Elsie Lee He­ung (1925-2006) ac­tu­al­ly start­ed off as mas play­ers with Harold Salden­ha in the 1950s. To­geth­er they cap­tured a to­tal of ten Band of the Year ti­tles, five apiece, be­tween 1966 and 1988. In to­tal these two pow­er cou­ples pro­duced some 62 bands be­tween 1961 and 1994. Harts' win­ning bands: 1966, 1970, 1983, 1986, 1988. Lee He­ungs' win­ning bands: 1967, 1975, 1976, 1977, and 1983.

Some names in the area of pi­o­neer­ing mas works are Cito Valasquez (1928-2006), Ken Mor­ris (1924-1992), Wil­fred Strass­er (40's-60's), Carlisle Chang (1921-2001), Wayne Berke­ley (1940-2011), Pe­ter Min­shall (1941- ) and Michael Headley, paving the way for the likes of Bri­an Mac­Far­lane and Dean Ackin/Monique No­bre­ga.

For a free e-book down­load our He­roes, Pi­o­neers and Role Mod­els (Cul­ture and the Arts, pages 38 to 79): www.sa­faripub­li­ca­tions.com/firstc­i­t­i­zen­stt/he­roe­spro­filestt/

The steel­pan evolved from skin drums from the 1830s to 1884 when a ban on all drum beat­ing was im­posed dur­ing the Car­ni­val cel­e­bra­tions at the time. It is the na­tion­al in­stru­ment of T&T and is the on­ly mu­si­cal in­stru­ment in­vent­ed in the twen­ti­eth cen­tu­ry. It is be­lieved that An­drew Bed­doe, an ac­com­plished Or­isha drum­mer and one of the best bis­cuit pan play­ers in Laven­tille, An­drew "Pan" De La Bastide, Win­ston “Spree” Si­mon, Vic­tor "Totie” Wil­son and Em­manuel "Fish Eye" Ol­livier­rie, were among those who cre­at­ed the im­pe­tus that led to the tran­si­tion from the skin drums to the 'ping pong' pan and the steel­pan. Their hard work and ded­i­ca­tion paved the way for the lat­er pan pi­o­neers, arrangers, and tuners. Some such no­table names, in no par­tic­u­lar or­der: El­lie Man­nette, Hugh Bor­de, Len “Boogsie” Sharpe, Ran­jit “Jit” Sama­roo, Leon “Smooth” Ed­wards, Pat Bish­op, Rudolph Charles, George “Son­ny” God­dard, Clif­ford Alex­is, Neville Jules, Clive Bradley, Bertram “Bertie” Mar­shall, Den­zil “Dimes” Fer­nan­dez, An­tho­ny “Tony” Williams, Os­car Pile, Ray Hol­man…

Ca­lyp­so emerged from the pe­ri­od of African slav­ery through the slaves, who, not be­ing al­lowed to speak much to each oth­er, com­mu­ni­cat­ed through song. Gros Jean, an African slave, is said to have been the first ca­lyp­son­ian, named 'Mait Caiso' (Mas­ter of Caiso) by the Diego Mar­tin es­tate own­er Be­gor­rat in the late 18th cen­tu­ry. In the ear­ly days, the songs were sung in pa­tois, in the ex­tem­po for­mat and con­tained colour­ful and ag­gres­sive lan­guage as well as mes­sages to the com­mu­ni­ty. The ca­lyp­so art form has spawned sub-gen­res such as so­ca, pow­er so­ca, groovy so­ca, rap­so, chut­ney so­ca, and rag­ga so­ca.

Among the ca­lyp­so­ni­ans (and com­posers) and those in the sub gen­res who have left or are leav­ing an in­deli­ble mark in this area of Car­ni­val in­clude Nor­man Le Blanc, Li­onel Be­las­co, Fred­er­ick “Hou­di­ni” Wilmoth, Ray­mond “Atil­la the Hun” Queve­do, Wal­ter Dou­glas, Eg­bert “Lord Be­gin­ner” Moore, Phillip “Lord Ex­ecu­tor” Gar­cia, Ru­pert “Lord In­vad­er” Grant, Nor­man “King Ra­dio” Span, Thel­ma Layne, Raphael “Roar­ing Li­on” De Leon, Kade “Lord Bryn­er” Si­mon, Ald­wyn “Lord Kitch­en­er” Roberts, Slinger “Mighty Spar­row” Fran­cis­co, McArtha “Ca­lyp­so Rose” Lewis, Garfield “Lord Shorty/Ras Shorty I” Black­man, Ed­win “Crazy” Ay­oung, Sun­dar Popo, Carl­ton “Blakie” Joseph, Al­ric “Lord Pre­tender” Far­rell, Pig­gy Joseph, Lar­ry Har­wood, Christophe Grant, An­drew “Broth­er Su­pe­ri­or” Mar­cano, Fitzroy “Lord Melody” Alexan­der, Lancelot Layne, Hol­lis “Chalk­dust” Liv­er­pool, Kelvin “Mighty Duke” Pope, Austin “Su­perblue” Lyons, Machel Mon­tano, Gre­go­ry/GB Bal­lan­tyne, Dru­patie Ram­goon­ai, Lu­ta­lo “Broth­er Re­sis­tance” Masim­ba, David Rud­der, Rik­ki Jai, Win­ston Devine…

Lest we for­get.