Carol Quash
A chance meeting between a musician and a vocalist at a popular live entertainment hub in Port-of-Spain has resulted in a music lover’s dream – a free show on August 12, at which jazz, soul, R&B, Caribbean influences and timeless classics will form a musical tapestry through storytelling and audience interaction.
The event, Small Talk: Unwrapped – Beneath the Music, will showcase co-founders of Blak Kofi, guitarist Dean Williams and vocalist and performer Alicia Knights, at Kafe Blues, on Wrightson Road – the very space that birthed their alliance.
“We met at an impromptu jam session at Kafe Blue last year and realised that we had similar taste in music, namely, jazz and old music. We hit it off musically, and since then we’ve been working together,” Williams told Guardian Media.
He said what struck him about Knights was the fact that she is not afraid to try the hard or obscure areas of music.
“So for me, as a musician, that's really great, because I have been playing pop and calypso and everything for decades now. So I'm kind of bored of the popular and easy stuff.”
Knights’ musical ability spans jazz, soul, gospel, classical and contemporary music, complementing Williams’ skill in playing the electric, acoustic, Spanish and classical guitar, as well as the trumpet, the double bass, the keyboard, and the drums.
“What she does is difficult and it takes time, so it's easier for many singers to just do popular stuff. And it’s the same thing with musicians. If this is our bread and butter, we do the easy stuff and get paid for it and we move on.”
Williams has been playing music professionally for 36 years, beginning in 1990 with the late calypsonian Denyse Plummer.
“Then I moved on to being a studio musician, a session player. And I worked at virtually every studio around Port-of-Spain from the 90s on to the 2000s. So I worked with a lot of artistes,” among them Mighty Shadow, Ajala, Lord Kitchener, The Mighty Sparrow, Calypso Rose and Roy Cape. He has also performed alongside musicians Etienne Charles and Tony Paul, and has performed and toured with bands such as 3 Canal, Kindred, Atlantik, and Machel Montano HD. Williams holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts with a specialisation in Western music, and a Master’s in Carnival Studies, both from the University of Trinidad and Tobago. He is currently a lecturer and guitar instructor at COSTAATT.
Knights, who developed her substantial performance career on the New York music circuit, has performed at venues such as Blue Note Jazz Club, Gracie Mansion and The Nuyorican Poet’s Café. She permanently returned home to T&T two years ago, after living in the US for 33 years.
“I left T&T at age 11 and yearned to be back home. I came for my sister’s wedding and her best friend’s wedding in early 2024. I literally woke up one day while on that vacation and decided to stay,” she said.
He re-entered the local music scene with the help of one of her father’s closest friends, Junior Hutson.
“He brought me to Kafe Blue one day. He wanted me to sing for the band there. There was a chemistry there, and the rest is history.”
Williams and Knights recently held their first Blak Kofi Small Talk show, which they deemed a success. This show will follow the same format.
“So it's pretty much like a small talk between us on stage and also between us and the audience,” Williams explained.
“So we literally do sit and chat about the songs, chat about ourselves, chat about the music. We chat about adulthood because we're both mature adults too. We speak about the songs, about the music, about me being an instrumentalist, about me being a man, about Alicia being a woman. These are, you know, the topics we speak about with the music.”
He said although they don’t have any original lyrical songs together, he has original music that he will be presenting, and together, they both have enough material to keep patrons entertained for hours.
“The last time we had our show, we started at 8.30 pm, and we finished like close to 11 pm, so we have enough gas to keep going. We have the stamina, and we have the variety. We can do anything, from classical pieces to musical theatre, to church gospel, to kaiso, to calypso, to reggae, to rock, to jazz, to calypso jazz, to steel band music.”
In addition, he said, he will be playing multiple instruments.
“I switch instruments from time to time, which is fun for me, and I think it's interesting for the audience to see that too.”
Doors open at 7 pm and the show starts at 8 pm.
