Gyasi Mer­rique

Se­nior Re­porter

gyasi.mer­rique@cnc3.co.tt

For­mer Ca­lyp­so Monarch Karene As­che will per­form first up in to­mor­row’s Ca­lyp­so Fi­es­ta at Skin­ner Park, San Fer­nan­do.

As­che pulled the num­ber many en­ter­tain­ers fear dur­ing the draw for the com­pe­ti­tion, con­duct­ed by Trin­ba­go Uni­fied Ca­lyp­so­ni­ans Or­gan­i­sa­tion (TU­CO) PRO Ron­dell Don­awa and gen­er­al sec­re­tary Shirlane Hen­drick­son at the Kaiso House Ca­lyp­so Tent at the Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah, Port-of-Spain, yes­ter­day.

As­che, who per­formed in po­si­tion three at Fi­es­ta 2023, did not com­ment to the me­dia fol­low­ing the draw, but promised that her 2024 song No Ex­cuse will set the pace in the Monarch race to­mor­row.

As­che, who won the ti­tle in 2011, will kick­start a loaded first half of the show which fea­tures Ham­mond “Slick” Bruce at num­ber two with his com­po­si­tion ti­tled Trinidad is Not a Re­al Place, Richard “Chro­mat­ics” Ra­jku­mar at po­si­tion three singing 2 Par­ty, and new­ly-mint­ed 2024 Na­tion­al Ac­tion Cul­tur­al Com­mit­tee (NACC) Young King Mi­cal Williams, more pop­u­lar­ly known as Mi­cal Te­ja, in po­si­tion num­ber four with his run­away Car­ni­val hit DNA

Ter­ri Lyons, the 2020 Ca­lyp­so Monarch, will per­form Play Pan­man in po­si­tion num­ber five and back-to-back win­ner (2014 and 2015) Rod­er­ick “Chuck” Gor­don is in po­si­tion six singing Charlsie.

Ra­jku­mar, a more con­ven­tion­al rap artiste, is mak­ing his first at­tempt at con­quer­ing one of ca­lyp­so’s most un­friend­ly are­nas.

“I’m def­i­nite­ly ex­cit­ed to be a part of it as a whole. For some rea­son, I can’t pull any­thing above ten but that’s al­right. We have some big names start­ing the show, clos­ing the show and through­out the show,” Ra­jku­mar said af­ter the draw.

Run­ner-up to Te­ja in the Young Kings com­pe­ti­tion, Guardian Me­dia’s Cas­ton Cu­pid, drew po­si­tion num­ber nine. He joked af­ter­wards that it was a nat­ur­al fit.

“You know, I love foot­ball. I am a strik­er, num­ber 9. I score goals.”

Cu­pid is­sued this stern­er warn­ing straight from the heart.

“When I watch the com­pli­ment of the draw, the show gets off to a bumper start im­me­di­ate­ly from num­ber one with Karene (As­che). And you see a num­ber of well-known and for­mer mon­archs com­ing down the road. The bar is go­ing to be set high and I am try­ing to ex­ceed the bar. So, I am sor­ry for the per­son com­ing af­ter me, which is Black Sage.”

Along with As­che, Chro­mat­ics, Te­ja, Lyons, Cu­pid and Black Sage, the first half of the show al­so has 2010 monarch Kurt Allen - The Last Bard­john of Ca­lyp­so, among the heavy hit­ters in po­si­tion 18.

And ear­ly in the sec­ond half, pa­trons will see the likes of Aaron Dun­can (23) and Win­ston “Gyp­sy” Pe­ters (27).

Machel Mon­tano al­so de­clined com­ment af­ter the draw but did say he’ll have his time to talk when he per­forms in po­si­tion num­ber 27. Mon­tano, who has made a sen­sa­tion­al re­turn to the ca­lyp­so stage, topped the pre­lim­i­nary round of judg­ing with 267 points on the judges’ cards.

The show kicks in­to an even high­er gear af­ter Mon­tano, with Heav­en “Snakey” Charles per­form­ing at po­si­tion 33, Bri­an Lon­don at 34, 2018 monarch Helon Fran­cis at po­si­tion 39 and Selvon “Mis­tah Shak” Noel round­ing off the cast in po­si­tion num­ber 40.

All 40 ca­lyp­so­ni­ans will vie for 10 spots in the Di­manche Gras fi­nal, where they’ll meet and aim to de­throne 2023 win­ner Ta’zyah O’Con­nor, along with reign­ing To­ba­go Monarch Dil­lon Thomas, who both re­ceived au­to­mat­ic spots in the fi­nal card­ed for Feb­ru­ary 11.

Ca­lyp­so Fi­es­ta be­gins at 2 pm, with gates open from 10.

The Draw:

1 Karen As­che - No Ex­cuse

2 ↓Ham­mon “Slick” Bruce - Trinidad is Not a Re­al Place

3 ↓Richard “Chro­mat­ics” Ra­jku­mar - 2 Par­ty

4 ↓Mi­cal “Mi­cal Te­ja” Williams - DNA

5 ↓Ter­ri Lyons - Play Pan­man

6 ↓Rod­er­ick Gor­don - Charlsie

7 ↓My­ron Bruce - Gun Smoke In The Dance­hall

8 ↓Romel Leza­ma - Re­al Talk

9 ↓Cas­ton Cu­pid - Straight From The Heart

10 ↓Phillip “Black Sage” Mur­ray - Stone

11 ↓Garth St Clair - Is It We An­them or We And Them

12 ↓Giselle Fras­er-Wash­ing­ton - We Go­ing Fight­ing

13 ↓Ezekiel Yorke - No Greater Gift

14 ↓Stephen Mar­celle - Coun­try of Sur­vival

15 ↓Alana Sinette-Khan - Shop­ping in Mi­a­mi

16 ↓Mark East­man - Gen­er­a­tion

17 ↓Crys­tal Charles - Stand­ing My Ground

18 ↓Kurt Allen - The First In­ves­ti­ga­tion

19 ↓Er­ic James - Is D Peo­ple

20 ↓Nakasa Thatch­er-Roberts - Find Ah Sta­tion

21 ↓Ri­val­do Lon­don - Here in T&T

22 ↓Nicole Thomas - The Truth Is

23 ↓Aaron Dun­can - Char­ac­ter

24 ↓Aaron Sin­nette - Tick Tock

25 ↓Sean Singh - Jack and Jill

26 ↓Win­ston “Gyp­sy” Pe­ters - Un­grate­ful

27 ↓Machel Mon­tano - Soul of Ca­lyp­so

28 ↓Shami­ka De­noon - Ah We Salt­fish

29 ↓Stacey Sobers-Abra­ham - Re­spect The Tribe

30 ↓Vic­to­ria Coop­er-Rahim - The En­e­my

31 ↓Kei­th Wa­son - Iden­ti­ty Cri­sis

32 ↓Wendy Gar­rick - Keep Yuh Head Up

33 ↓Heav­en “Snakey” Charles - Wake Up Ca­lyp­so

34 ↓Bri­an Lon­don - Hell

35 ↓Michelle Hen­ry - When The Fight­ing Start

36 ↓Nao­mi Sin­nette - Dem Ad­vi­sors

37 ↓Ker­ine “Tiny” Williams-Fi­garo - Through These Eyes

38 Alex “To­ba­go Chalkie” Gift - The Feud

39 ↓Helon Fran­cis - Rep­re­sent­ing We

40 ↓Selvon “Mis­tah Shak” Noel - De Re­turn