Calypso rivalries friendly and vicious

CALYPSO feuds weave their way through calypso history. Atilla the Hun and Executor had an ongoing feud in the 1930s. Around 1937, Executor defended himself in a calypso called They Say I Reign Too Long, which was sung to the santimanitay melody.

“From back in time that is how calypsonians confronted each other, but one got the impression that these were not serious feuds. The battle generally ended with calypsonians cheering each other and sharing the prize, which was generally beer, stout or cigarettes. The competition was bloodless. They established prestige and bragging rights,” says calypso historian and University of the West Indies (UWI) Professor Emeritus Gordon Rohlehr.

The battles became serious when younger singers emerged and tried to challenge the older ones.

“There are stories of Executor having to leave Port of Spain and ending up in St Joseph because calypsonians sang so viciously against him.”

Picong had its limits – even for Executor, who went unchallenged in extempo for some time.

“One singer called him a half-skull mulatto. He didn’t like being attacked by his race. It was difficult to defeat him in a fair fight. Beginner said you had to ambush Executor.”

So the younger singers became more vicious in their attacks.

“The issue became where to draw the line,” says Rohlehr. “Younger singers attacked heroes and heroes couldn’t attack back in the same kind of language. There were rules – not written, simply understood.”

One famous confrontation in the post-World War I era happened between Houdini and Atilla the Hun. Calypsonians claimed Houdini took other calypsonians lines and sang his picong based on what others had sung. Houdini attacked Atilla the Hun in a calypso called Lorrito about a young woman who had fallen from grace and ended up an alcoholic living by the rum shop door. Houdini sang "Aye Lorrito, I want everyone to know what a nice girl you were before" – and he goes ahead and says before she met Mr Quevedo – Atilla the Hun.”

The friendly rivalry between Slinger Francisco (Sparrow) and Fitzroy Alexander (Lord Melody) shows the emergence of calypso feuds as a form of advertisement or a publicity stunt.

“Sparrow and Melody’s feud came from the fact they were good friends and they were both at the point of questioning money vs tradition. Both got contracts with RCA Victor in the mid 1950s. Sparrow stayed in New York to record and calypsonians felt he should be back home defending his crown. Sparrow made a choice about singing for pay and trying to become a professional rather singing for convention and winning something in a calypso competition like a silver cup,” says Rohlehr.

Rohlehr says Melody told him in an interview the Sparrow/Melody controversy was a marketing ploy, much like you’d promote two boxers or wrestlers. Together they sang about 14 calypsoes attacking each other. “Sparrow sang about Melody’s ugliness and Melody sang that he was making more money because of his so-called ugliness. They had to pay tough entertainment fees in US, and they both figured the way to beat that was to marry American women. Sparrow married a white woman; Melody married a black woman and they both began singing about their wives,” says Rohlehr.

Quite possibly Sparrow and Melody weren’t even writing these songs.

“Both might have had songs written by Reginald 'Piggy' Joseph,” says Rohlehr.

Then came the Sparrow/Kitchener feud.

“Kitchener started singing during World War II. He went to England and in that gap, Sparrow emerged in the 1950s. When Kitchener returned to Trinidad in 1963, people remembered the earlier Kitchener and promoted him as a traditional calypsonian and Sparrow was presented as someone changing calypso, bringing in pop songs and spoiling calypso. That was the basis of the controversy,” says Rohlehr.

“In one version of Kitchener’s return Sparrow invited him because he felt calypso needed some injection of new controversy because Melody was singing with Harry Belafonte in New York. On Kitchener’s return, a rivalry broke out. It got to a point where Kitchener said he would never appear on a stage with Sparrow again.”

The latest and most bitter calypso feud defining calypso pits Sugar Aloes (Michael Osouna) against Cro Cro (Weston Rawlins). Is it a publicity stunt or is it real? Cro Co and Aloes discuss their feud in the next story.