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Wednesday November 25, 2020
Let me please begin by thanking the Executive of the BACA [Barbados Association of Calypsonians and Artistes] for their kind invitation to give this address. I congratulate you on this historic initiative in establishing your Association. At a time when the government has promised to give emphasis and prominence to the cultural industries, you have made a very strategic decision informing the Association. I wish you every success. When I accepted the invitation, little did I know that you wished me to speak about “the importance of the calypso to the people of the Caribbean”? That is a topic of such vast dimensions that, unless I am very selective in my remarks, I may well be liable to prosecution for loitering or causing you physical and mental harm.
If any of you attended the funeral service of the late Sir Don on 29 December 2018, you may recall my provocative assertion that no other music has the range, depth, breadth, or versatility of the calypso. So, to attempt a comprehensive analysis of the importance of the calypso to the Caribbean people would be an exercise that cannot be completed in 30 minutes. Nevertheless, I shall select some examples of the contribution of the calypso – on a purely arbitrary basis – to provide a flavor, a sample of the power and importance of the calypso. And I do so to assist the younger artistes in the Association in understanding the history of the calypso and its struggle for respect and acceptance.
Prof. Gordon Rohlehr, the leading academic writer and researcher on the calypso, treats the calypso “as a mirror that reflects and as a lens that either magnifies or reduces the phenomena on which the nation’s restless and excitable psyche feeds”. But let us start with a definition of calypso from the perspective of the practicing calypsonian. In 1968 the Mighty Duke asked the question, “What is Calypso?” He gave this answer:
“It is an editorial in song of the life that we undergo. That I know is true calypso.”
And then he explained the varied repertoire of calypso in these words:
“We sing you things that you self does say
I mean we bring you events of the day
Anybody business, we come right here and we let you know
Mauvais langue as it’s sung, that is calypso!”
David Rudder’s “Calypso Music” (1987) has two lines that capture the power of the calypso. He sings:
“It is a living vibration rooted deep within my Caribbean belly
Lyrics to make a politician cringe, or turn a woman’s body into jelly.”
Historically, the calypso has examined virtually every aspect of our human experience and recalled and commented on world events from Test Cricket to the launch of satellites. It began as the storytelling griot of the days of slavery that, in time, gave way to the chantuelle and then spawned the calypsonian. Its history has been inextricably linked to the history and struggle of black people in the Caribbean. So that we cannot properly assess the social and political history of the people of the region without understanding and appreciating our oral traditions including the calypso and the genius of its several practitioners.
By Rawle Gibbons, Canboulay Productions, Tunapuna, Trinidad (1994).
It is argued that the first recording of calypso was made by Lovey’s Orchestra in New York in 1912. However, my assessment of the importance of the calypso to the Caribbean begins in 1934 when the recording company Decca recorded Atilla the Hun and the Roaring Lion in New York, followed by Lord Beginner and the Growling Tiger in 1935. These vinyl recordings introduced the calypso to North America and were instant hits, especially Lion’s “Ugly Woman”. But the popularity of the calypso in North America did not last long.
At this time in the Caribbean, including Barbados, there were no television or wireless radio stations. The few who could afford a radio receiver with shortwave might have been lucky to hear some of the calypsos of the pioneers I just mentioned. Very few people paid attention or listened to the calypso.
In the forties, the wired service of Barbados Rediffusion broadcast the recordings of Roaring Lion, Atilla the Hun, Lord Caresser, and a few others. There was no Barbadian calypsonian at that time, and, in any event, calypso music was considered “devil music” or “banja”, not to be played generally and certainly never on a Sunday! In Barbados, it was as though there was tacit censorship of calypso music. But a change was coming.
On 22 June 1948, the first significant group of West Indian migrants landed at Tilbury docks in England from the ship “Empire Windrush”. Among those who disembarked were Lord Beginner and Lord Kitchener. The Mighty Terror joined them in 1952 and, in the decade of the fifties, they recorded a steady stream of calypsos on the Melodisc label and sent them to the Caribbean and West Africa. Radio Trinidad, Barbados Rediffusion, and Radio Demerara made sure that the listening public was kept abreast of the racial issues, extortionate landladies, tasteless food, cricket heroes, and the wiles of women in England as told through the calypsos of Kitchener, Beginner, and Terror. For example, “If you’re not white, you’re black”, “My Landlady”, “Food from the West Indies” (Kitchener), “Victory Test Match” (Beginner), and “Chinese Children Calling Me Daddy” (Terror).
Calypso legends; from right, Caresser, Atilla the Hun, The Roaring Lion and Lord Executor
In Trinidad and Tobago, a calypso metamorphosis took place in 1956. Not only did Lord Melody record “Mama Look a Boo Boo” which became an international hit but the Mighty Sparrow burst onto the calypso scene with “Jean and Dinah”. He brought a special charisma to the artform. He brought sweetness of voice and vocal dexterity allied to his command of the stage through his sheer presence and dramatic flair. But, most importantly, Sparrow brought a zeal for improving the status and fortunes of the calypsonian. He was deeply conscious that his monetary prize for winning the calypso crown in 1956 was $25.00 and he protested the substantial prizes given to the Queen of Carnival vis-à-vis a calypsonian who made the music for the masqueraders. He, therefore, led a group of leading calypsonians to boycott the competition in the Queen’s Park Savannah in 1957 singing “Carnival Boycott”.
Here are the first verse and chorus of that calypso:
“I going play me mas’ as usual
Because I love Carnival
But no competition for me
In San Fernando or the City
They could preach Peter or Paul
I won’t even go Savannah to see football
Chorus
I intend to keep all my costumes on the shelf
Let them keep the prize in Savannah for they own self
And let the Queen run the show
Without Steelband and Calypso
Who want to go, can go up dey
But me ain’t going nowhere.”
Sparrow found a willing ally in Lord Superior who sang “Brass Crown”, whose chorus goes like this:
“The Queen gets refrigerators
Machines, radios and motor cars
Sometimes a Simmons bed
And all the King get is a brass crown on his head.”
So, the decade of the fifties was a golden period for the growth and development of calypso thanks to the pioneers in Britain and Sparrow, Melody, Spoiler, Christo, and Striker in Trinidad. It was a time when Sparrow, Melody, and the Cyril Diaz Orchestra came to Barbados annually for shows at the Plaza and Globe cinemas. Gradually the infectiousness of the music began to infiltrate the sedate and conservative Barbadian psyche and persona. In Barbados, however, calypso was slow to take root. The only practitioners of the artform in the fifties were the Mighty Charmer, the Mighty Jerry, Shilling, and George Bruce (aka “The Biscuit Man”).
By 1958 the Jaycees put on a carnival and every year thereafter until 1964. Guyana was an important market for calypso during the fifties and sixties. Sparrow admits that he honed his skills performing in Guyana for weeks with Lord Melody and recording there. In the meantime, two Guyanese calypsonians, Lord Coffee and King Fighter performed so well in Trinidad that they made the finals of the 1957 competition. The calypso took North America by storm following Melody’s recording of “Mama Look a Boo Boo”. Irving Burgie and Harry Belafonte produced a Long Playing Record called “Calypso” in 1956. It was the first record to sell a million copies. Once again, however, the popularity of the artform did not last long although a plethora of artistes has recorded calypsos including Robert Mitchum, Chet Atkins, Nat Cole, Louis Armstrong, and The Andrews Sisters. You know of course, that the Andrews Sisters recorded Lord Invader’s “Rum and Coca-Cola” in 1945. It was such a popular hit and big seller that it is said to have made the sisters $7 million. After court proceedings, Lord Invader and the bandleader who wrote the melody, Lionel Belasco, each received US$150, 000.00.
From the sixties onwards, calypso’s popularity within the Caribbean increased exponentially. Kitchener returned to Trinidad and offered serious rivalry to Sparrow’s dominance. Other important calypsonians captivated Caribbean audiences, for example, Christo, Black Stalin, Shadow, Duke, Lord Shorty, Maestro, Merchant, Relator, Composer, Calypso Rose, Singing Francine, Denyse Plummer. In Barbados, Sir Don, Gabby, Lord Radio, Lord Sivers, Destroyer, and Romeo were followed by the Merrymen, Viper, Grynner, Serenader, Red Plastic Bag, John King, Ras Iley, Kid Site, Adrian Clarke, Colin Spencer, Poonka, Bumba. In St. Vincent we saw the emergence of Beckett; in Antigua – Short Shirt, Swallow, and King Obstinate and, of course, Arrow from Montserrat. Jamaica was not insulated from the influence of the calypso. In 1974, Bryon Lee took his band the Dragonnaires to Trinidad and Tobago for carnival. That was the beginning of an annual visit by the band to Trinidad and Tobago but it had a critical reciprocal effect in that it led to the emergence of a carnival in Jamaica. Ultimately, Jamaicans have come to accept calypso and soca. For the last 40 years of the twentieth century, when Caribbean people were able to listen by wireless radio to and enjoy the musical output of those calypsonians and artistes I mentioned through their records and CDs, we witnessed a virtual explosion of Caribbean calypso talent in this region.
From the devil music and the perception of calypsonians as rum shop dwellers, the calypso gained respectability by the sheer quality of its musicality, its wit, humor, imagination, and its lyrical relevance to our societies. In 1965 Sparrow sang “Outcast” in tribute to the struggle of the calypsonian and steelbandsman. The chorus tells the reality of that struggle:
“Calypsonians really catch hell for a long time
To associate yourself with them was a big crime
If your sister talk to a steelband man
Your family want to break she hand
Put she out
Lick out every teeth in she mouth
Pass You! Outcast!”
As I said in my tribute to Sir Don, it was in 1982 that calypso really took hold in Barbados and began an irresistible journey towards acceptability and respectability among Barbadians. It was at last able to break free from the strangulation of colonialism and imperialism and the innate conservatism of Barbadians that had retarded its growth and development. It is a strange coincidence that just as 1956 had been a watershed year for calypso in Trinidad and Tobago because of Lord Melody’s “Mama Look a Boo Boo” and Sparrow’s “Jean and Dinah”, 1982 was the watershed year for calypso in Barbados because our two most decorated and revered calypsonians, Gabby and Red Plastic Bag released “Jack” and “Sugar made us Free” to win the Road March and Tune of the Crop crowns respectively.
The empirical evidence is compelling that the world has accepted that calypso is an artform born out of the struggles of black people before and after Emancipation. It is an artform that is integral to our celebration of carnivals in Toronto, Notting Hill, Miami, Brooklyn, as much as it is to our celebration in Port-of-Spain, Kingstown, St. John’s, Basseterre or Bridgetown, and even Kingston. David Rudder has described the calypso as “mother music” meaning that it has given birth to other musical idioms such as the mento and reggae of Jamaica. Indeed, in his 2004 calypso “Where the Calypso went?” Valentino said that the late Lord Brynner told him that “Bob Marley and the Wailers picked up some vibes from we calypso”.
Reverting, before I close, to the Rohlehr metaphors of the calypso as a mirror of society on the one hand, and a lens on the other, I endorse Chalkdust’s observation that the calypso has made “an outstanding impact on the social, political and cultural life of the people of Trinidad and Tobago in particular and the Caribbean, Europe and the Americas in general”. Time will not permit me to detail the several ways in which that impact has been expressed through specific calypsos. I shall just mention Sparrow’s “Federation”, Stalin’s “Caribbean Unity”, Gabby’s “Boots”, Red Plastic Bag’s “The Country Sick”. Equally, the calypso has had an indelible impact on the social, political, and cultural life of the Caribbean region. Think of Duke’s “Black is Beautiful”, Gypsy’s “Sinking Ship”, Cypher’s “If the Priest Could Play”, Deplé’s “Vote them Out”, and the influence of Sparrow’s early political calypsos eulogizing Dr. Eric Williams and the Peoples National Movement. I think of “William the Conqueror”, “PAYE”, “You can’t get away from the tax”, and “Leave the damn doctor”. Indeed, Sparrow was so influential that the people treated him with a certain degree of deification; a person whose utterances in calypso were a kind of gospel of truth. Sparrow had such powerful influence that Trinidadians coined the phrase: “If Sparrow say so, it’s so!”
We can be confident in asserting that, throughout the Caribbean at times of Carnival or Crop Over Celebrations, the local populations and visitors will be assured of hearing calypsos dealing with the prominent issues of the day, scandals, and events of note such as the celebration of sporting excellence. Regrettably, however, we used to be able to look forward to a reasonable diet of humour in the rendition of calypsos but that is no longer the case. Today, the diet of the calypso is heavily laden with social and political commentary. And, so far as soca is concerned, according to the late Pretender, “there is a scarcity of words in their composition”.
However, in celebrating carnival and similar festivals, masqueraders are more concerned with the rhythm, beat, and tempo of contemporary soca. These masqueraders are residents of our countries as well as visitors lured into participating in the festivals primarily by the music. Without the music of calypso and soca, there would be no mas’. But while we properly celebrate carnival and the festivals as significant unifying cultural events in the Caribbean region, we should never lose sight of the tremendous contribution that such cultural extravaganzas make to the economies of our countries. They generate substantial revenues and provide opportunities for increased employment activity in the several services ancillary to the festivals. Some time ago I read that the relevant authorities in Barbados estimate the contribution of Crop Over to the economy at $80 million. I am told that Trinidad and Tobago estimate carnival’s contribution to the economy at US$100 million. Those estimates must surely give you some idea of the importance of the calypso to Caribbean people.
If further objective evidence is needed to demonstrate the importance of the calypso to Caribbean people beyond its use at their celebrations of carnival worldwide, we need only look to the University of the West Indies (UWI) and the University of Trinidad and Tobago (UTT). I invite you to analyze the message and the implications inherent in the conferment of Honorary Doctorates by the Universities on the following persons:
UWI
The Mighty Sparrow
Black Stalin
The Mighty Shadow (posthumously)
Roy Cape
Lord Superior
Winsford “Joker” Devine
Pelham Goddard|
The Mighty Gabby
Red Plastic Bag
UTT
Lord Kitchener (posthumously)
And I doubt that the Government of Barbados would have appointed Gabby, RPB, and Alison Hinds as Cultural Ambassadors of Barbados if it was thought that the calypso was an artform of no account.
And why was the Spring Garden Highway nearby renamed “The Mighty Grynner Highway”? Was it not in recognition of Grynner’s contribution to the development of the calypso as an aspect of our broader cultural development? Do I need to say any more?
*An Address given to the Barbados Association of Calypsonians and Artistes (BACA), Barbados, February 19, 2020.
Sir David is a man of many interests outside the law and had an illustrious career in politics as a Member of Parliament, and Attorney General of Barbados (1985-1986 and 2002-2012) during which time he modernized the Administration of Justice. He acted as Prime Minister on a number of occasions between (1970-1974) and served as Chief Justice (2002-2010).
Sir Davis was also chairman of two important Commission of Inquiries; the first into attempted coup d’etat which occurred in Trinidad and Tobago on 27 July 1990; and the Commission of Inquiry into civil unrest in Kingston, Jamaica in 2010.
He is a trumpet player and an avid collector of calypso music. He held the national record for the 100 yards race in 1960 and was a good enough cricketer to have been invited to trials for Barbados in 1958. He ghostwrote the biography of Charlie Griffith, (“Chucked Around”), former West Indies Test cricketer in 1970, and raced horses for many years in Barbados.”