Lisa Shandilya

T&T re­mains the on­ly coun­try with a de­fined Car­ni­val sea­son, a cul­tur­al cal­en­dar that stretch­es far be­yond the tra­di­tion­al two days be­fore Ash Wednes­day. For Car­ni­val 2026, fes­tiv­i­ties opened on No­vem­ber 7, 2025, un­der the theme “Yuh Go Love Dis,” and con­tin­ued un­til mid­night on Feb­ru­ary 17, 2026. The re­sult is a 100-day show­case of na­tion­al cre­ativ­i­ty and com­mu­ni­ty en­gage­ment.

De­spite the length of the sea­son, at­ten­dance at many cul­tur­al events con­tin­ues to de­cline, with both lo­cal and in­ter­na­tion­al par­tic­i­pa­tion steadi­ly falling. Yet, tourism mar­ket­ing still clings to the out­dat­ed idea. It wrong­ly presents Car­ni­val as mere­ly a sin­gle week of fes­tiv­i­ties. Their cam­paigns most­ly high­light fetes and mas.

His­tor­i­cal­ly, Car­ni­val ac­tiv­i­ty in­ten­si­fied by mid Jan­u­ary. Ca­lyp­so tents once drew strong lo­cal and in­ter­na­tion­al au­di­ences and served as key stages for so­cial and po­lit­i­cal com­men­tary. They al­so helped shape the per­form­ers who ad­vanced to Di­manche Gras. To­day, there is pos­si­bly one ca­lyp­so tent that faces dwin­dling at­ten­dance. Long-stand­ing dis­putes over com­pe­ti­tion rules, es­pe­cial­ly con­cern­ing the Ca­lyp­so Monarch con­tin­ue to dis­cour­age in­ter­est.

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar re­cent­ly in­di­cat­ed that cer­tain per­form­ers’ di­vi­sive po­lit­i­cal rhetoric may have con­tributed to de­clin­ing sup­port. Al­though her re­marks re­ceived crit­i­cism, the de­crease in au­di­ence lev­els over the years re­mains in­dis­putable. Per­haps there is a need to mod­ernise and pro­mote the ca­lyp­so tents. Over the years, ca­lyp­so icon “Mighty Chalk­dust” has of­fered valu­able in­sights in­to the artis­tic im­por­tance of the tent tra­di­tion. His ob­ser­va­tions high­light the cul­tur­al val­ue of the tents, and the sig­nif­i­cant, still un­tapped po­ten­tial they hold.

Un­der­stand­ing the cul­tur­al ecosys­tem re­quires ex­am­in­ing its struc­ture. In 2025, the Min­istry of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment (MC­CD) re­placed its pre­de­ces­sor, main­tain­ing part­ner­ships with the Na­tion­al Car­ni­val Com­mis­sion (NCC), Pan Trin­ba­go, Trin­ba­go Uni­fied Ca­lyp­so­ni­ans’ Or­gan­i­sa­tion (TU­CO), and oth­er stake­hold­ers. Al­though the en­ter­tain­ment and band sec­tors among busi­ness stake­hold­ers are ex­pe­ri­enc­ing sig­nif­i­cant growth, lev­els of cul­tur­al par­tic­i­pa­tion have de­clined.

NCC’s of­fi­cial cal­en­dar lists dozens of events, many cit­i­zens are un­aware of the her­itage val­ue be­hind tra­di­tion­al ac­tiv­i­ties. Sin­gle Pan com­pe­ti­tions suf­fer from poor turnout, a con­cern echoed by BP Rene­gades steel­band leader Du­vone Stew­art. TU­CO events and oth­er cul­tur­al show­cas­es of­ten at­tract most­ly rel­a­tives and ded­i­cat­ed sup­port­ers un­til lat­er com­pe­ti­tion rounds. Stick-fight­ing, Ex­tem­po and Can­boulay al­so face stag­na­tion. Even the Kings and Queens com­pe­ti­tions, once a ma­jor na­tion­al at­trac­tion, now strug­gle to fill seats.

This year, MC­CD in­tro­duced FLA­VA, a new culi­nary and en­ter­tain­ment ini­tia­tive aimed at show­cas­ing the na­tion’s food cul­ture which was free to en­ter. The con­cept drew both lo­cals and vis­i­tors, but it re­quired sig­nif­i­cant pub­lic in­vest­ment. Its long-term sus­tain­abil­i­ty must now be ad­dressed. The op­er­a­tional mod­el must al­so be eval­u­at­ed if it is to re­main a per­ma­nent part of the sea­son.

Pan Trin­ba­go de­liv­ered one of the sea­son’s bright spots through an im­proved judg­ing sys­tem, re­sult­ing in smoother pre­sen­ta­tions and strong au­di­ence turnout. Youth par­tic­i­pa­tion is ris­ing, sig­nalling a promis­ing fu­ture for the steel­pan. How­ev­er, tele­vised pro­duc­tions con­tin­ue to face chal­lenges due to the lack of ex­pe­ri­enced sound en­gi­neers ca­pa­ble of ac­cu­rate­ly cap­tur­ing the in­stru­ment’s depth.

In­fra­struc­ture re­mains an­oth­er ma­jor con­cern. Pre­serv­ing T&T’s sta­tus as a pre­mier Car­ni­val des­ti­na­tion will re­quire in­vest­ment in venue up­grades. Mod­ern pro­duc­tions de­mand stages that sup­port large cos­tumes, chore­og­ra­phy, spe­cial ef­fects, drone shows, and com­fort­able seat­ing. Even the “drag” area, which is a fea­ture that should re­main, but it re­quires care­ful re­view. The na­tion does not lack cre­ativ­i­ty or tal­ent, what is miss­ing is a co­he­sive frame­work to sup­port in­no­va­tion while pro­tect­ing au­then­tic­i­ty.

Car­ni­val 2026 was man­aged well. The Min­istry of Cul­ture and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment ac­tive­ly par­tic­i­pat­ed on the ground. Un­der the stew­ard­ship of Min­is­ter Michelle Ben­jamin, they en­sured it was a safe and suc­cess­ful event. Con­grat­u­la­tions to all the artistes, bands, de­sign­ers, and com­peti­tors who par­tic­i­pat­ed and ex­celled in the var­i­ous com­pe­ti­tions. Your tal­ent, ded­i­ca­tion, and com­mit­ment to ex­cel­lence make Trinidad Car­ni­val tru­ly ex­tra­or­di­nary!”

I strong­ly be­lieve that fo­cussed plan­ning, strate­gic mar­ket­ing, tar­get­ed in­vest­ment and a will­ing­ness to mod­ernise tra­di­tion­al events are nec­es­sary. With these ef­forts, the Car­ni­val Sea­son can re­gain its full im­pact.

As the coun­try looks to 2027, strength­en­ing NCC’s paid events is cru­cial. It is al­so es­sen­tial to bet­ter in­te­grate cul­tur­al pro­gram­ming through­out the 100-day sea­son. T&T has the po­ten­tial to de­liv­er a world-class cul­tur­al event, one wor­thy of its un­matched Car­ni­val lega­cy.