A conscious people, are we?
THE EDITOR: Soca and Calypso as we know it, may just become non existent in 20 years to come, or even less. Trinidad and Tobago the land of bacchanal of free spirit may miss these two important components of our carnival. The question is, who is destroying our culture? When we can stand by and let two Jamaica artistes acquire $40,000 US each (which is the fee normally charged) for Soca Monarch guest appearances, then we must be unconscious. The reality of the situation is that we are slipping into a coma, having to depend on a machine for life support and to which eventually we may have to switch off. Come on people, let us do the mathematics here, $40,000 x 2 = $80,000 US. $80,000 is approximately $480,000 TT, more than the first prize money. Then they would look to tell us that they can not have no more than ten competitors on that night because there is no more money allocated towards any more of our Trini-bred soca artistes. The year prior had 17 contestants and the defender made it 18, and the money was much less. I must thank the CEO of Caribbean Prestige Promotion, Mr William Monroe for his contribution to the art form for these many years, but it seems that has lost faith in Soca, that it would not be able to bring the money nor crowd that he desires. We as a nation must prove him wrong, that there is no need to bring these two outsiders from a country that does not care about our music, nor culture. Although I respect both Beenie Man and Elephant man and love their music, I just don’t think it is appropriate for that night. LATOYA CALLENDER Port-of-Spain
Comments
"A conscious people, are we?"