[UPDATED] Late start to parade of the bands in Chaguanas, Tobago

The parade of the bands in Chaguanas got off to a very late start on Carnival Tuesday, with the first band crossing the stage after 4 pm.

From around midday, visitors began to arrive at the site to stand near the stage installed by the Chaguanas Carnival Committee.

Twelve bands in total passed in front of the judges.

The first band to parade was Central Elite with a presentation of masked people dressed in black followed by Madness Crew loaded with colourful masked people.

Then Wing-O-Rama also made its presence felt with a large number of masked people and several individual presentations.

Also crossing the stage were Fancy Clowns/Flanagin Town Police Youth Club, Jab-A-Mien Cultural Performers, The Clan Mas Productions, Draconic Inferno Mas, First Citizen Original Jab Jab, Central Uprings Sport, Trinicalor, Braso/Tabaquite Police Youth Club and Majestic Mokos.

In Tobago, the parade of the bands also got off to a late start.

At around 3 pm, more than four hours after the parade’s official starting time of 11 am, a handful of bands were crossing the Calypso Rose Boulevard stage at the Milford Road Esplanade in Scarborough, which was the first judging point.

Newsday caught up with Cultural officer II at Division of Tourism, Culture, Antiquities & Transportation Jesse Taylor at the stage.

“Obviously, there is a slow start. A slow start but I know definitely that the Culture department would have done their due diligence and would have done a placement on Carnival and the essence of Carnival.”

The first band to cross the stage was Lovern Stewart’s – the forbidden garden of winx.

Questioned about the small numbers, Taylor could give no definite response.

“They are small and what could account for that I don’t know – but I was happy to see though that there was the emerging of new names. It says to me that somewhere along the line we’ll be able to do better in the future.”

February Carnival, he said “needs to be tailored in a way that carnival can be best expressed.”

“I would like to see a lot more focus on traditional mas, I would like to see a lot more focus on children’s mas. I think obviously the work is there to be done to really start the process early and to by somewhere engage youth clubs, police youth groups, performing companies, community groups more so the schools.”

There was also a visibly low spectator turnout, however, as the evening progressed, more people came out to view the mas.

–With reporting by
Kinnesha George-Harry

This story was originally published with the headline Late start to parade of the bands in Chaguanas and has been updated to include additional details. See original post below.

The parade of the bands in Chaguanas got off to a very late start on Carnival Tuesday, with the first band crossing the stage after 4.

From around midday, visitors began to arrive at the site to stand near the stage installed by the Chaguanas Carnival Committee. Twelve bands in total passed in front of the judges.

The first band to parade was Central Elite with a presentation of masked people dressed in black followed by Madness Crew loaded with colourful masked people.

Then Wing-O-Rama also made its presence felt with a large number of masked people and several individual presentations.

Also crossing the stage were Fancy Clowns/Flanagin Town Police Youth Club, Jab-A-Mien Cultural Performers, The Clan Mas Productions, Draconic Inferno Mas, First Citizen Original Jab Jab, Central Uprings Sport, Trinicalor, Braso/Tabaquite Police Youth Club and Majestic Mokos.