Trinidad’s fabulous Carnival has its origins in the Roman feast of Saturnalia, a midwinter celebration of birth, renewal and inversion of the norm. This developed, during the Middle Ages, into the Feast of Fools, in which the pretensions of the Catholic Church were scabrously mocked despite the Church’s best efforts to suppress it. These traditions survive in the ethos of Trinidad and Tobago’s modern-day Carnival, which both maintains a healthy dose of fight-the-power satirical rebellion and serves as a last bacchanalian binge (carne vale loosely translates as “farewell to flesh”) before the fasting period of Lent.
Introduced to Trinidad by French planters in the late eighteenth century, Carnival was initially the preserve of the white Creole establishment. A comparatively decorous affair, it consisted of masked balls that allowed the gentry a brief fictive escape from the “cares” of power and respectability: the men would dress as “negres jardins” (field labourers), the women as “mulatresses”, representing their slaves or their husbands’ mulatto mistresses.
Carnival was also celebrated in semi-secret by slaves on the plantations; after emancipation in 1834, free Africans took their own Carnival procession onto the streets in bands, protected by groups of batonniers or stick men. Continuing the tradition of inversion, some costumes satirized the affectations and eccentricities of the French Creoles, with men dressing as Dame Lorraines: caricatured planters’ wives with fancy gowns and exaggerated breasts and buttocks. Other characters – the little demon known as jab jab and the stilt-walking moko jumbie – drew on West African traditions and folklore. The parade was enlivened by the use of percussion instruments and the introduction of canboulay, which celebrated the end of the difficult and dangerous pre-harvest burning of sugar-cane fields by parading through the streets with flaming flambeaux – the name is derived from the French cannes brûlées, or burning cane.
Disapproving of what they saw as the “desecration” of the Sabbath by the first day of Carnival, the British authorities decreed in 1843 that the festivities could not begin until Monday morning. Since no time was specified, carnivalgoers started celebrating on the stroke of midnight, and today’s anarchic Jouvert parade was born. Many of the masquerades acted out in the street processions took the form of trenchant satires of the colonial government, and in 1846 the authorities attempted to prohibit the wearing of masks. Carnival found defenders in unexpected quarters, however: the French planters, keen to defend their own traditions in the face of increasing Anglicization; and the “Free Coloured” middle class, whose desire for respectability kept them aloof from Carnival itself but who saw attempts to control it as an assertion of white domination.
Carnival continued to provide an outlet for irreverence and satire through the nineteenth century, with outrageous parodies of British sailors stationed on the island, as well as characters representing underworld archetypes, such as jamettes (prostitutes) and transvestite pissenlets (literally “wet-the-bed”). Bands organized drumming and kalenda (stickfighting), none of which went down too well with the colonial administrators from Victorian Britain. In 1877, police chief Captain Arthur Baker began a campaign to tame Carnival, but when he attempted to ban the canboulay outright in 1881, the so-called Canboulay Riots broke out (commemorated today in a dawn re-enactment on the Friday before Carnival). Undeterred, the authorities went on to prohibit what had become known as “jamette Carnival” on the grounds of its lewdness. African-style drumming was banned in 1884, while canboulay and stickfighting – seen respectively as a fire hazard and an incitement to violence – were outlawed a year later under the Peace Preservation Act.
Carnival was not so easily quashed, though it continued in a more sedate manner. Social protest was channelled into the emerging labour movement, and Carnival became an officially tolerated safety valve for social pressures, with the black middle class joining in. During the 1890s, the festival became increasingly organized and socially acceptable with the introduction of a competition for best band, and in 1921, the calypsonian Chieftain Douglas opened the first organized calypso tent to preview the songs that would be heard in the forthcoming Carnival.
During World War II, Carnival was suspended by the colonial government as a possible threat to public order, and when it returned on VE Day 1945, it marched to the sound of a different beat – the steel pan, fashioned from oil drums brought to the island by the US military. As the national independence movement gained momentum, Carnival flourished alongside. Recognizing its importance to Trinidad’s cultural identity and sense of nationhood, Eric Williams established the National Carnival Commission in 1957 to organize and promote the festivities, and set up the Calypso King competition.
Though parades during the 1970s saw masquerade bands exploring topics such as racism and white control of the economy, and Peter Minshall’s fabulous presentations in the 1980s and 1990s took mas to a new creative level, Carnival today is more about fun than politics, satire or social inversion. “Pretty mas” bands of revellers decked out in identikit costumes of feathers and beads are now the order of the day, and given the high price tag and exclusive aura of the prevailing all-inclusive mas bands, many now argue that Carnival has turned full circle, with the parades the sole preserve of the rich. Equally, though costume construction has traditionally been highly specialized and skilled, the drive to cut costs means that most bikini mas isn’t even made in T&T these days, instead being imported from the Far East. Nonetheless, designers such as Brian MacFarlane and K2K have brought out contemporary bands with a creative edge, and since 2017 the Lost Tribe offshoot of pretty-mas behemoth Tribe has been producing imaginative and inspired costumes. And with smaller outfits continuing to create gorgeous sailor and fancy Indians mas, and the wonderful Touch D Sky taking moko jumbie mas to another level, it seems that the unique skills of Trinidad’s mas-makers are likely to be continued in future generations.
Bands These are not musical bands, but an organized group of costumed masqueraders that parade trough the streets on Carnival Monday and Tuesday to the sound of soca blasted from huge music trucks.
Chipping Slow, shuffling dance-cum-walk with a rhythm dictated by the music from trucks and steel bands.
Fete A large open-air party or concert held during the run-up to Carnival.
Jump up To dance in the parade.
Mas camp The headquarters of Carnival bands, where costumes are made and displayed, and where you can register to play mas.
Old mas Traditional Carnival characters such as jab jabs, imps and sailors.
Play mas To join a Carnival band and take part in the costumed parade.
Road march The soca song played the most at the judging points along the Carnival route – the winner gets the coveted road march title for that year.
Rhythm section The classic accompaniment of Jouvert, as well as the “engine room” that drives a steel band, this is a percussion group who “beat iron”– scrapped brake drums from cars or vans played with metal rods alongside cowbells, shakers and anything that can make a rhythm.
Wining The classic hip-wiggling, gyrating Trini dance, which comes in many variations: be prepared to wine, and be wined on, at any point during Carnival.
To the eye of an uneducated onlooker, the two explosive days of the main Carnival parades might appear a chaotic spectacle, but underpinning the whole event is an order and structure that is the culmination of exhaustive preparations. The countdown begins in late summer, when the large mas bands hold launches for their Carnival designs. Once Christmas is out of the way, things get serious. The big steel bands open up their yards for visitors to watch practice sessions, calypsonians perform their Carnival compositions in “tents” in Port of Spain and around the country, and each week features a bewildering choice of pre-Carnival fetes, from raucous affairs featuring foam and powder paint to seriously classy all-inclusives where tickets starting at TT$500 – with the high-end events costing double that.
On the Saturday before Carnival weekend, the parades in Port of Spain kick off with the Red Cross Children’s Carnival, with kids displaying their costumes at the Savannah; the following day, there’s a children’s parade along Western Main Road in St James. The Sunday sees the popular Panorama semi-final at the Savannah, which sees crowds of aficionados descend to watch the bands perform, and is usually a bigger event than the final itself. It’s also the day to take in some traditional mas, with characters from blue devils to Dame Lorraines, jab jabs and midnight robbers parading from South Quay to Adam Smith Square on the two Sundays preceding Carnival; there are often additional parades too. (Another blue devil parade, which some equate as the highlight of Carnival, takes place on Carnival Monday itself up in Paramin, where wild posses of blue devils take to the streets in the afternoon and continue well into the night.) Sometime in the week preceding the main parades, the finals of the national stickfighting competition are staged at the Savannah, with bois-bearing combatants duelling it out to exciting effect.
On the weekend immediately preceding the main Monday and Tuesday parades, “Fantastic Friday” sees a re-creation of the Canboulay Riots at 5am in downtown Port of Spain, and the Soca Monarch competition in the evening, while on Saturday there’s another Children’s Carnival parade from South Quay to the Savannah, which makes way for the Panorama finals later that day. On Sunday evening, the Dimanche Gras competition includes the crowning of the King and Queen of the Bands and the all-important Calypso Monarch.
Carnival officially starts at 4am on the Monday morning with Jouvert or dirty mas, when participants dress in macabre or satirical home-made costumes, or join a mud band and smear themselves with mud, grease, body paint or liquid chocolate before taking to the streets in an anarchical expression of Carnival’s darker side. This wild party lasts into the daylight hours of Monday, and even if you’re not playing with a Jouvert band, it’s still a good idea to wear old clothes, as revellers delight in getting everyone as dirty as possible. Certainly, it’s a time to leave your inhibitions (and your valuables) at home.
TEN COMMANDMENTS OF PLAYING MAS
• Get to Trinidad in time to collect your costume early and make any necessary adjustments; you can buy supplies at several shops in Port of Spain. Listen to the radio, tap into the year’s soca on YouTube and go to some fetes so you know all the year’s big tunes before you hit the road.
• Cut your toenails very short to minimize damage from the pummelling they’ll take on the road, and wear quality, well-fitting, worn-in footwear and absorbent sports socks.
• If you’re going to wear tights with your costume, get them early before shades and sizes run out. Buy two pairs in case of snags, and cut the toes off to avoid damaging your nails. Micles in West Mall and Samaroo’s have a good selection.
• Build up your stamina with some exercise before the main event; some of the larger mas bands organize pre-Carnival walks and runs.
• Take souvenir selfies before you leave home when everything’s looking fresh; on the road, consider taking a basic mobile handset rather than your smartphone, cheap sunglasses (designer shades inevitably fall off when you’re dancing and get trodden on), and a small and easy-to-carry bag for phone, keys, money etc.
• Eat a good breakfast before setting out, don’t skip lunch, and drink water throughout the day. Alternate alcoholic drinks with something soft.
• No matter what your skin colour, start Carnival Monday and Tuesday by dousing yourself in factor 50 sunblock. Take some with you, and re-apply it regularly. Aerosol sunblock is easier than cream.
• Prearrange how you’ll be getting home on both days – book a cab, or designate a driver. Try to find out where your band will be finishing to simplify pick-ups.
• Everyone loosens up a bit come Carnival, but don’t lose sight of your common sense. Stick with your friends, don’t accept drinks from strangers, and if you can’t find a toilet en route, don’t head off alone down dark alleys.
• Smile for the cameras, wine, wave, chip and jump – it’s Carnival!
Once the bacchanal of Jouvert has dispersed, the Carnival Monday parade begins by 10am, when the mas bands take to the streets, with masqueraders wearing either parts of their costume, a hotpants/shorts and T-shirt combo or more elaborate “Monday Wear” (these days local designers offer special Monday Wear collections each year), and dancing along to the accompaniment of steel pan bands or monstrous trucks bearing columns of speakers. Tuesday is Carnival’s big day, kicking off at 7am and with masqueraders dressing in full costume and parading through the streets as loudly and proudly as they can. All bands follow set routes, with judging points along the way where panels of experts (and crowds of spectators) wait to mark those competing for Band of the Year. The main “stage” and judging point, where each band struts as much of its stuff as possible, is the Queen’s Park Savannah in Port of Spain (and in Tobago, Scarborough’s Market Square). Some of the larger, more upmarket bikini bands nowadays forego the Band of the Year title, eschewing the Savannah for “Socadrome”, an alternative display space in the Jean Pierre Complex on Wrightson Road, which was established in 2014.
Carnival’s las’ lap kicks in at dusk on Carnival Tuesday when everything becomes just a bit more frantic as the last hours of the event are made the most of, with large bands such as Harts and Tribe continuing the party at the Socadrome. As night draws in, Carnival officially ends and the countdown to next year’s event begins.