Sevel Nicholls carries on Tan-Tan tradition

Carnival Queen competitor Sevel Nicholls may be best remembered for her portrayal of the Power of Love Fancy Sailor costume in Peter Minshall’s 2020 band Mas Pieta, but she’s also upholding a family tradition. Since 2013, she has been the power behind Tan-Tan, half of Minshall’s famous giant puppet duo.

Nicholls, a professional stilt-walker and dancer, has always been involved in the performing arts and Carnival. She has been a dancer and a numbers girl between 1997 and 2011 in the kings and queens competition, performed with the Kilimanjaro School of Art and Culture and toured with the Julia Edwards Dance Group.

"Numbers girls came out with a card with the position of each king or queen for the competition. The audience nor judges will not miss the order because even when it is announced sometimes both judges and spectators may not hear. What we did was create our own personal show by lovely costuming and sometimes, when possible, blending colour schemes so that we sometimes appeared as mascots for particular portrayals. This was also an exciting feature since the audience always looked forward to the girls, costumes and the dance moves that created the whole package," Nicholls explained.

She began performing as a queen with Brian MacFarlane in 2010, portraying Dame Gwo Bunda in the band Resurrection: The Mas.

“I was a performer prior to 2010, and it was then that MacFarlane saw how strong I was and opted to do a stilt queen.

"We didn’t place well, because the costume would have broken on stage as I was exiting. They said I worked it too much and it broke. We were heartbroken, as before that it was the popular winner for 2010.”

In 2011, she was the queen for the Caribana Toronto Revellers in Canada, and in 2012 she played queen for medium band So Be it. She said it was this performance which captured the attention of Minshall.

“It was a unique story. My aunt is Allyson Brown, who has been portraying Tan Tan for years. She retired in 2012 and I was given the opportunity.

"Since 2013, any portrayals of Tan Tan and Saga Boy would have been myself and Earl Thompson. I would have had the opportunity to tour with Tan Tan and Saga Boy as well.”

In 2020, when Minshall produced Mas Pieta, Nicholls performed as The Power of Love. She said, as with all her costumes, there is more to the performance than just wearing it onstage. She said while artists like Mac Farlane and Minshall design the costumes, the team learns about their vision and the background through meetings and sketches.

“Being there, working on your costume in the mas camp, so you can actually have that feel and know the work that is put into the costume to give the life of it – it’s better worked that way, when you have a sense of what you are doing and how to do it. The artists tell stories and bring out the life in the costume. We then build our costume based on the concept and then have rehearsals to bring life into it.

“The life we bring into the costume is a spiritual thing. It’s not that we just build a costume and portray it, because it’s not built on wheels, the costume is the life of the performer. So rehearsals after rehearsals, the performers have to be there to know the costume, the materials that you’re using, how they are being used, what movement can be given to the costume to bring them to life. That has been my greatest experience in the building and portraying of these costumes.”

Nicholls said it was unfortunate that the pandemic had stolen the togetherness of Carnival, as Minshall had had great plans for 2021.

She said she would miss the buildup to the performance, working with the team, technicians, and designer to put on a great performance.