Don’t stop the Carnival

Don’t Stop The Carnival is the title of Lord Invader’s unforgettable 1939 calypso, made even more famous by Harry Belafonte and the Mighty Sparrow.

“Tell you friends it's a big calamity; Carnival time is a big necessity.”

The one and only Olatunji Yearwood created a modern soca version that was like the leitmotif of the cancelled 2021 Carnival.

But covid is still here and we did stop the Carnival again this year. Tomorrow, banks and many workplaces, even schools, will try to forget that we should all be having a day of entertainment, imaginative self-expression and making merry, even on the beaches.

The first time Trinis were unsettled by Carnival’s cancellation was in 1881, and the cause was the historical Canboulay Riots, which started in the wee hours of Monday, February 28, 1881, 141 years ago to the day. French-speaking and English-speaking stick fighters clashed with the police who tried to rein them in.

As John Cowley writes in the wonderfully researched and presented West Indian Rhythm, the Canboulay riots mark the pivotal moment in the evolution of the Carnival, becoming the concern of the Colonial Office in London and the local administrators and inhabitants here in Trinidad. In an 1882 Colonial Office report, from which many recommendations were adopted, there was one that, “During each Carnival season the Admiralty station a man-of-war in the harbour at Port of Spain, and this became a regular Naval duty.” Police forces were increased as well.

The second cancellation came during WWII. Lord Invader’s lyrics – "Don't stop the Carnival" – could be heard again when Governor Sir Hubert Young decided that the pre-Lenten festivities would not take place during the war years.

Then, in 1972, ten years after Independence, our government delayed Carnival owing to a polio outbreak. In his calypso Rainorama, Lord Kitchener immortalised that very soggy, miserable, rainy Carnival in May when the clouds never stopped emptying their moisture,

Last year, there was no Carnival, but our reaction to none in 2022 is different. There is a sort of tired resignation, a general sense of disillusionment. It may be linked to the depressive effect of covid lockdown and to our deep disappointment that we have been deprived yet again of the revelry or the time to escape from it. We are also disheartened by the seeming inability of the entities responsible for elements of the Carnival to organise themselves in a convincing manner. We cannot believe that Carnival cannot stand on its own two or four feet and is so very dependent upon government funding, when it definitely should not be that way.

We are amazed that funding was so late in coming because it shows that there is little understanding of the creative needs behind the Carnival. It shows, too, how the creatives have been too slow in taking the bull by the horns, waiting instead for the cumbersome, moribund locomotive of officialdom to grind its way to a decision. We should have known that the Carnival could be cancelled and made our own plans, secure in the knowledge that the final decision would come too late to be useful to anybody, least of all the creative community.

Of course, there are exceptions but, overall, it is not a good story to tell about such an important cultural event that has had to fight to exist. For sure, it does not get any easier. When the John Cowleys of the future catalogue the Carnival music and goings-on of the years since WWII, I wonder what they would write of this year in particular.

We are back to a time that none of us could have imagined, with Russia squaring off against Europe and what has become known as the West. I did not see last weekend’s ole mas show but current key world leaders might well have been the focus of some mean picong. Instead of WWII Zeppelins that so captured people’s imaginations, we now have drones. How many 2022 calypsoes are talking about this incredible time and the rise of China, the giant that has awakened and is growling sotto voce in the corner while Russia enters into the boxing ring, seeking a fight with the allied West? Putin is no fool, so there is an endgame that he is playing for. What is the prize he is after? Speculation is rife, so why not some clever musical commentary too?

In 1940 Atilla the Hun suggested that Hitler be sent to St Helena, “For he’s a peace of the world destroyer.” Where should we send Putin now? King Radio, in his 1939 The War calypso, sang about Hitler: “As a dictator to fill his cup, he means to dominate the whole of Europe…Both men agreed and signed the Munich Pact and Hitler tear up the agreement behind Chamberlain back; There and then he started with the same old game, stating that he needed Poland again.” Only the names and a few details need change, similar story.

And the beat goes on.

Happy no Carnival 2022.