Sascha Wil­son

Al­though sad­dened by the pass­ing of Dr Leroy “Black Stal­in” Cal­liste, many who at­tend­ed the pub­lic view­ing of his body in San Fer­nan­do on Wednes­day could not re­sist sway­ing, shak­ing and singing to his mu­sic.

Rec­ol­lect­ing fond mem­o­ries of watch­ing him per­form live or danc­ing to his mu­sic, many who spoke with Guardian Me­dia at the JE Fu­ner­al Home at Cof­fee Street agreed that his mu­sic tran­scends bound­aries and will live on for­ev­er.

There has been an out­pour­ing of love and trib­utes since Black Stal­in passed away at his San Fer­nan­do home on De­cem­ber 28. He was 81.

In keep­ing with the fam­i­ly’s re­quest, pho­tos and videos of Cal­liste’s body were strict­ly pro­hib­it­ed. He was dressed in white and gold African at­tire.

When the view­ing be­gan around 2 pm, there was a slow but steady flow of peo­ple, in­clud­ing school chil­dren. A playlist of his songs was played in the back­ground while his tro­phies, awards and pho­tos were on dis­play.

Gre­go­rio Ros­ales, who lives at Mara­cas/St Joseph, be­gan weep­ing while view­ing his body.

“He made a beau­ti­ful con­tri­bu­tion in his life. My tears is for the great things he has done, his beau­ti­ful songs. I have great mem­o­ries when he come down in the pan yard in Port-of-Spain,” he said.

Joyce Pan­tin-Top­pin and her friend An­gela Williams-Baird al­so paid their last re­spects to the ca­lyp­so icon.

Williams-Baird, who mi­grat­ed to the Unit­ed States as a young girl, re­called see­ing him walk­ing through Carl­ton Lane to go to the tai­lor.

She said they at­tend­ed the con­cert in his ho­n­our at Har­ris Prom­e­nade on Tues­day night and they will al­so be at his fu­ner­al to­day.

The five-time Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch, who was award­ed the Hum­ming­bird Medal Sil­ver Award, will be laid to rest on Thurs­day.

The pro­ceed­ings are ex­pect­ed to start at 9 am with a street pro­ces­sion from the JE Guide Fu­ner­al Home to the South­ern Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts where a ser­vice will be held.

This will be fol­lowed by an­oth­er street pro­ces­sion to the Par­adise Ceme­tery.