Is Calypso in the UK a dying art form? Authors: Patrice Lewis Kerlon Winchester
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hen I asked a few friends what they knew about Calypso in the United Kingdom, they all referred to the Windrush Era, when Calypso was reintroduced to the British public by Lord Kitchener, Mighty Terror, Roaring Lion and Lord Beginner in 1948. Some were even baffled that Calypso was still around in the UK with the rise and popularity of Soca, commonly referred to as the “Soca Scene”. Calypso music originated in Trinidad and Tobago during the mid-19th century and spread to the rest of the Caribbean later in the 20th century. Calypso is a derivative of Kaiso which stems from West African music and was brought to the Caribbean by enslaved Africans. Kaiso was used to sing about their masters and Kaisonians would gather in “tents”, a practice which continues today. The art form is still very popular in Trinidad and Tobago and WWW.INSIDESOCA.COM
the Caribbean and conveys feelings with pun and innuendo, topics of political context and current affairs. Calypso was first introduced in the UK around the end of World War 1 and was again made popular by The Greats mentioned earlier. Cheeky lyrics in the song by Lord Kitchener “My Landlady’s too rude, in my affairs she likes to intrude” expressed how the British Caribbeans felt and were treated when they came to Britain as citizens of the Mother Country and not as immigrants. Calypso was a way of making lighthearted fun of the dark times they faced. In the early 1950s, the average Brit was exposed to Calypso on a nightly basis on the current affairs programme – Tonight, on BBC television. Throughout the first half of that decade, Calypso dominated the public’s imagination with, Beginner, Terror, Invader, Roaring Lion and Lord Kitchener recording with music labels like EMI-Parlophone, Melodisc, and Lyragon. However, by the late 1950s, the appetite for foreign music veered off in another direction 19
DECEMBER 2020
