San­dra L Blood

To­mor­row at 6.30 pm, City Hall, Port-of-Spain, will come alive with the sights and sounds of T&T’s rich cul­tur­al her­itage as the Mal­ick Folk Per­form­ing Com­pa­ny (MF­PC) stages Mélange – A Fu­sion in Mo­tion.

The mul­ti-award-win­ning folk group, a ten-time Prime Min­is­ter’s Best Vil­lage Tro­phy Com­pe­ti­tion win­ner, promis­es an evening of artistry and sto­ry­telling that will have au­di­ences on their feet.

Chore­o­graphed by An­ton Brew­ster—ace artis­tic di­rec­tor, tal­ent­ed par­ran­dero, and cul­tur­al spe­cial­ist—the pro­duc­tion will show­case the com­pa­ny’s work over the past year through dance, mu­sic, vo­cals, and in­stru­men­tal per­for­mances.

De­scribed as “a show like no oth­er,” Mélange will fea­ture per­form­ers from across three groups:

• Ju­nior Ju­niors (ages 4–12)

• Ju­nior Se­niors (ages 11–16)

• Se­niors (ages 17 and old­er)

Au­di­ences will be drawn in­to the sto­ry of Mélange—a sym­bol­ic fig­ure in­spired by a unique­ly Trinida­di­an ex­pe­ri­ence—who trans­forms from a soucouyant in­to some­thing far greater.

A pas­sage from Chap­ter Two of the pro­duc­tion of­fers a glimpse in­to her mys­ti­cal jour­ney:

“I was trapped in a world where the food of the soul is the rhythm and the hum of the drum, and the flavour of every ounce of life is in the glide of the feet as they shuf­fle along. I was caught up in a mag­ic I couldn’t es­cape—an­cient rhythms and arte­facts that called me in the still of the night by the burn­ing flames of the day’s sun. It burned in­side me. And when I couldn’t help meh­self, I trans­formed in­to what I first strug­gled to un­der­stand … but if I was to ex­plain it in an eas­i­er way, every­thing that’s full of flavour needs salt.”

Along­side Brew­ster, MF­PC’s ex­ec­u­tive team in­cludes Nisha Roberts-Hen­ry (chair­man and fi­nan­cial comp­trol­ler), Marie Guer­ra (vice-chair­man and pub­lic re­la­tions of­fi­cer), Stasha George-Col­lis (ju­nior com­pa­ny co­or­di­na­tor), Chyvonne Nurse (youth co­or­di­na­tor), and Jem­ma Jor­dan (sec­re­tary and busi­ness man­ag­er).

To­geth­er, they up­hold the or­gan­i­sa­tion’s mot­to—“To Strive for Ex­cel­lence”—and en­sure that every per­for­mance re­flects that stan­dard.

Mélange – A Fu­sion in Mo­tion runs for two and a half hours, with a 15-minute in­ter­mis­sion. Pa­trons are asked to be seat­ed by 6.15 pm.

Tick­ets cost $200 and can be pur­chased from any MF­PC mem­ber, by call­ing 489-5723 or 746-4389, or at the door.