KEVON FELMINE

Se­nior Re­porter

kevon.felmine@guardian.co.tt

There was a va­ri­ety of mu­si­cal styles at La Trop­i­cal Night­club in San Fer­nan­do on Sat­ur­day night for the Chut­ney So­ca Monarch (CSM) semi­fi­nals.

A to­tal of 32 artistes vied for a cov­et­ed spot in the grand fi­nals on March 1 to chal­lenge Rick Ram for the ti­tle.

The venue was packed to ca­pac­i­ty for the com­pe­ti­tion which fea­tured an in­creased num­ber of pop­u­lar so­ca artistes. The night was a spec­ta­cle of tas­sa drums pound­ing, dancers swirling, with colour­ful de­pic­tions of house­wives and tanties adding to the the­atri­cal flair.

From the start the com­pe­ti­tion hit high gear with reign­ing Ca­lyp­so Monarch and six-time In­ter­na­tion­al So­ca Monarch win­ner Machel Mon­tano mak­ing an elec­tri­fy­ing leap in­to the chut­ney so­ca are­na. Per­form­ing his lat­est chut­ney so­ca track, Pep­per Vine, Mon­tano, fa­mous­ly known as the So­ca Monk, de­liv­ered an en­er­getic rou­tine, win­ing and jump­ing across the stage with his sig­na­ture dy­namism.

Just the night be­fore, he per­formed the same song along­side chut­ney star Dru­patee Ram­goon­ai and La­dy La­va at the Mega Fête at Bri­an Lara Sta­di­um. This time, even with­out co-singers, he had the crowd in a fren­zy.

Sexy Vanes­sa and Olatun­ji turned up the the­atrics with Iz Ah In­di­an Wed­ding, a per­for­mance that was noth­ing short of a Bol­ly­wood spec­ta­cle. Dressed as a dul­han (bride) and dul­ha (groom), they even brought wed­ding food on stage, to the de­light of the au­di­ence. It was a per­for­mance filled with cul­ture, hu­mour, and high-en­er­gy show­man­ship.

Nine-time CSM win­ner and crowd favourite Rik­ki Jai de­liv­ered a smooth and melod­ic per­for­mance with Hap­py An­niver­sary, a song that per­fect­ly cap­tured the essence of the Car­ni­val sea­son—an in­vi­ta­tion to “pop a bot­tle and cel­e­brate!” The au­di­ence lapped up the nos­tal­gia, singing along to every word.

Robin J and Su­perblue teamed up for Mil­lion­aire, a track that was a true blend of chut­ney and so­ca. While the fu­sion was seam­less, it lacked the punch to ig­nite the crowd, though it was still well-re­ceived.

So­ca songstress Jadel brought a vi­su­al spec­ta­cle to the stage, win­ing ef­fort­less­ly as she per­formed Awo Na along­side Shi­va M. Their play­ful, se­duc­tive chore­og­ra­phy added an ex­tra di­men­sion to the song’s in­fec­tious rhythms, mak­ing it one of the stand­out per­for­mances of the night.

Oth­er no­table per­for­mances came from for­mer CSM cham­pi­on Neval Chate­lal, 2004 Na­tion­al Chut­ney Monarch Adesh Sama­roo, Ree Han­na, Chut­ney Em­press, Neil Ram­dass and Re­ece, Chris Gar­cia, and War­rior Princess, each de­liv­er­ing their unique spin on the chut­ney so­ca genre.

CSM is ex­pect­ed to an­nounce fi­nal­ists by 1 pm to­day.

The stage is set, the ex­cite­ment is build­ing, and the bat­tle for chut­ney so­ca su­prema­cy is far from over!