Pe­ter Ray Blood

Just Friend­slaunch mas band

The month of Au­gust has many days to go and no few­er than ten mas bands have al­ready launched their pre­sen­ta­tions for Car­ni­val 2014. The lat­est of these was Just Friends which un­veiled Ziegfeld Fol­lies last Sun­day in St James.

With a core com­mit­tee in­clud­ing pop­u­lar DJ Earl Cros­by, Ann Marie Placide and vet­er­an mas­man Chris Humphrey, the group at­tract­ed a packed Brun­ton Road venue, like­ly com­pris­ing mas­quer­aders of all ages. The launch al­so at­tract­ed two for­mer na­tion­al King of Car­ni­val win­ners in Pe­ter Samuel Jnr and Tony Al­leng; for­mer Wayne Berke­ley in­di­vid­ual Rose­mary Stone; for­mer Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Mar­tin Joseph; and, ju­nior Car­ni­val band­leader Dune Ali.

The Ziegfeld Fol­lies were a se­ries of elab­o­rate the­atri­cal pro­duc­tions on Broad­way in New York City from 1907 through 1931. They be­came a ra­dio pro­gramme in 1932 and 1936 as The Ziegfeld Fol­lies of the Air.

In­spired by the Folies Berg�res of Paris, the Ziegfeld Fol­lies were con­ceived and mount­ed by Flo­renz Ziegfeld, re­port­ed­ly at the sug­ges­tion of his then-wife, the en­ter­tain­er An­na Held. The shows' pro­duc­ers were turn-of-the-20th-cen­tu­ry pro­duc­ing ti­tans Klaw and Er­langer.

Mod­els dis­played some beau­ti­ful­ly de­signed cos­tumes by Mar­i­on George, Janelle Greaves and De­von Jerome. Nine sec­tions were show­cased, in­clud­ing Bert Williams, Ziegfeld Girls, Fan­ny Brice, Show­girls, Tableau Vi­vants, Rio Ri­ta and Ziegfeld.

In a twist to oth­er all-in­clu­sive mas band launch­es, Just Friends served ex­clu­sive In­di­an cui­sine at its launch, de­lec­tably pre­pared by San­dra Ma­hadeo and a team from Freeport.

The menu in­clud­ed sa­heena, pie, dou­bles, bhaiga­nee, kutchoree and oth­er Asian good­ies. Com­plet­ing the fare was a well stocked bar by Stel­lar Ex­ec­u­tive Ser­vices.

Just Friends, an amal­gam of 'friends' who've played mas with promi­nent mas men like Pe­ter Min­shall and Wayne Berke­ley, brings pedi­gree to the mas land­scape. Next year marks the band's sixth year on the cir­cuit and it has al­ready gleaned a Band of the Year (Medi­um) ti­tle in 2012, and placed fifth in this year's com­pe­ti­tion. Placide feels that her pro­duc­tion crew has the know-it-all and ex­pe­ri­ence to re­turn to win­ners' row again next year.

Cos­tumes can be viewed at Cros­by's Mu­sic Cen­tre, on West­ern Main Road, St James, or on­line at the band's Web site: www.just­friend­stt.com

King meets King

Cro Cro cel­e­brates 40 years in kaiso

The man hailed by his fans and even those who fear him as 'the Mighty Midget' will on Au­gust 28 and 29 cel­e­brate his 40th an­niver­sary in the kaiso are­na with a grand con­cert at the Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts (Na­pa), Port-of-Spain. Ti­tled King Meets King, the con­cert will see the four-time Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch shar­ing the stage with reign­ing In­ter­na­tion­al Pow­er So­ca Monarch and Na­tion­al Road March cham­pi­on Su­perBlue.

Leg­endary mu­sic pro­duc­er and band leader Pel­ham God­dard will, along with his Roots Ca­lyp­so Or­ches­tra, pro­vide ac­com­pa­ni­ment through­out the evening. Al­so in the line-up of artistes with roy­al claim is 1982 Na­tion­al Monarch Scrunter, as well as oth­er ca­lyp­so­ni­ans, so­ca artistes and oth­er acts the names of whom will be re­leased in the weeks lead­ing up to the show.

Cro Cro won four Na­tion­al Ca­lyp­so Monarch ti­tles–1988 (Three Bo Rats; Cor­rup­tion in Com­mon En­trance); 1990 (Po­lit­i­cal Dic­tio­nary; Par­ty); 1996 (Dey Look for Dat; Sup­port Com­men­tary Ca­lyp­so); and, 2007 (Nobo­by Ain't Go Know). He placed sec­ond in the Ca­lyp­so Monarch com­pe­ti­tion in 2005 (Oh Grena­da; Chop Off They Hand); and, 2008 (Re­spect for the Fourth King).

Hail­ing from the vil­lage of Buenos Aires, Cro Cro de­fines him­self as a true ca­lyp­son­ian who com­pos­es all of his songs him­self and sings on be­half of the com­mon man. He sings what most peo­ple are afraid to say in re­gards to po­lit­i­cal and so­cial is­sues, many times in­cur­ring the wrath of politi­cians and those in­volved in the po­lit­i­cal are­na with his no holds barred lyri­cal style.

The bard has been known to anger even fel­low ca­lyp­so­ni­ans be­cause he calls it as he sees it, but every­one will agree that when Cro Cro sings we all have to lis­ten.

It wasn't me.

Be­fore re­spond­ing to the many folk who com­ment­ed on this col­umn last Fri­day, per­tain­ing to the Top 50 ca­lyp­so­ni­ans of the 20th cen­tu­ry, let me say that I am NOT the au­thor of the list pub­lished. In fact, the list was com­piled by Trin­ba­go Uni­fied Ca­lyp­so­ni­ans Or­gan­i­sa­tion (TU­CO), the legal­ly elect­ed um­brel­la body of the ca­lyp­so art form in T&T.

Pulse read­ers, like Ge­of­frey Dunn of Ca­lyp­so Dreams fame, Harold Moy­lan, Gail Be­har­ry-Marchan, Nass­er Khan and US-based disc jock­ey Mike An­drews, I have tak­en note of your sug­ges­tions of ca­lyp­so­ni­ans who ought to have been in­clud­ed in the list, like Hou­di­ni (Fred­er­ick Wilmoth), Ca­ress­er, Bryn­ner (Kade Si­mon), Bro Su­pe­ri­or, Strik­er, Sug­ar Aloes (Michael Os­ouna), Mighty Gab­by and Red Plas­tic Bag. I'd like to al­so point out that the list per­tained to T&T ca­lyp­so­ni­ans and not bards from be­yond our shores, so singers like Swal­low, Short Shirt, Mighty Gab­by, Aja­mu and Red Plas­tic Bag could not have been in­clud­ed. But, I thank you all for your spir­it­ed par­tic­i­pa­tion.