From Calypso to Soca: The Sound of Trinidad Carnival

Every Carnival has a soundtrack, and in Trinidad that soundtrack has a long family tree. The soca blasting from a music truck on Carnival Tuesday is the grandchild of songs sung in French Creole around stick-fighting rings in the 1800s. Along the way it passed through calypso tents, wartime London, a Rastafarian's forest retreat and the global charts. Here is how kaiso became calypso, how calypso gave birth to soca, and how to tell your groovy from your power.

Kaiso and the chantwell

Calypso in Trinidad and Tobago is mainly of African origin. It traces back to West African traditions of improvised song, songs of self-praise and of scorn for others, brought to the Caribbean by enslaved people.¹ Where the word itself comes from is still argued over. The National Carnival Commission (NCC) lists the main theories: kaiso, a Hausa word meaning "bravo"; the French carrousseaux, a drinking party; the Spanish calliso, a tropical song; or the Carib carieto.¹ Many Trinis still shout "kaiso!" in appreciation of a good line.

The first great voices were the chantwells (from the French Creole chantuelle). In the stick-fighting tradition of kalenda, a lead singer would encourage or deride the fighters inside the ring, backed by a chorus of women, often singing in patois.² That call-and-response, the chantwell's call and the crowd's answer, is still the heartbeat of every soca performance where the singer shouts "put your hands up" and thousands obey.

Calypso became what the NCC calls the "poor man's newspaper": in a time when few people could read, songs carried the news, the scandal and the political argument of the day.¹

Tents, brigades and the first records

As calypso became a professional art, singers gathered in calypso tents, venues where audiences paid to hear new songs each Carnival season. The name stuck from the days when performers literally sang on stages covered by a tent.³

Calypso was among the earliest Caribbean music to be recorded. Lovey's String Band from Trinidad recorded in New York in 1912, and in 1914 the Victor company recorded chantwell Julian Whiterose, the "Iron Duke", whose sides are often cited as the first calypsos sung in English.^{4 5}

The first wave of professional calypsonians, the "Old Brigade", included Growling Tiger, Lord Beginner, Atilla the Hun, the Roaring Lion and Lord Pretender. Around 1945 a "Young Brigade" rose with more entertaining songs: Lord Kitchener, Mighty Spoiler, Mighty Dictator, Lord Wonder, and later the Mighty Sparrow.¹

Three giants

Lord Kitchener

Aldwyn Roberts, born in Arima in 1922, became Lord Kitchener. In 1948 he arrived in Britain on the Empire Windrush and sang "London Is the Place for Me" for the newsreel cameras, becoming the voice of a generation of Caribbean migrants.⁶ He came home in 1962, and he and the Mighty Sparrow dominated the calypso competitions of the 1960s and 1970s. He won the Road March 11 times in all, from "Jump in the Line" in 1946 to ten more titles between 1963 and 1976, but only one Calypso King crown, in 1975.⁶ Steelbands loved his melodies, and his songs were chosen again and again for Panorama.⁶ His total of 11 Road Marches stood as the record until Machel Montano matched it in 2025.⁷

Mighty Sparrow

Slinger Francisco was born in Grenada in 1935 and grew up in Laventille, Port of Spain. In 1956 he won both the Calypso King competition and the Road March with "Jean and Dinah", a sharp song about life after the American servicemen left Trinidad.⁸ Known as the "Calypso King of the World", he went on to win the Calypso King or Monarch title eight times and the Road March eight times.⁸ He died in New York on 27 September 2026, at the age of 91.⁹

Calypso Rose

Linda McCartha Monica Sandy-Lewis was born in Tobago in 1940. In 1977 she became the first woman to win the Road March, with "Gimme More Tempo", and in 1978 she became the first woman to win the national calypso crown.¹⁰ The NCC notes that her win signalled the entry of many more women onto the calypso stage, and the competition, long called Calypso King, became the Calypso Monarch.^{1 10}

Calypso and the steelband

Calypso and pan grew up together. The steelband emerged between about 1935 and 1945, when the tamboo bamboo bands of Port of Spain began swapping bamboo for metal containers and discovered that a hammered surface could change pitch.¹¹ From the mid-1950s to the late 1960s, Pan Trinbago recalls, steelbands ruled the road on Carnival days, and in 1963 the Panorama competition was introduced, with Pan Am North Stars winning the first title.¹² Each band arranges a calypso or soca tune for Panorama, which is why a great Carnival song can live twice: once on the road, and again at the Savannah when a full steel orchestra plays it back to you.

Lord Shorty and the soul of calypso

By the early 1970s many young Trinidadians were turning to reggae, soul and funk. Garfield Blackman, the calypsonian Lord Shorty, set out to give calypso new energy, and he found it in Trinidad's Indian musical heritage.

In 1973 Shorty released "Indrani", which blended calypso with Indian instrumentation, including the dholak (a small hand drum) and the dhantal (an iron-rod percussion instrument from chutney music). It brought together the musical traditions of Trinidad's two largest communities.¹³ His mid-1970s follow-up "Endless Vibrations" (sources date it to 1974 or 1975) dropped the Indian instruments but kept their rhythms on drums and guitar.¹³

Shorty called his creation sokah, the "soul of calypso". A journalist's altered spelling, "soca", is the one that stuck.^{13 14} Later, troubled by how the music was being used, Shorty embraced Rastafari, took the name Ras Shorty I and moved his family to the forest at Piparo. From the late 1980s he recorded "jamoo", a fusion of soca and gospel.¹⁴

The Road March

The Road March is the song played most often by the bands as they cross the official judging points during the Monday and Tuesday parade. The winner is announced by the Trinbago Unified Calypsonians' Organisation (TUCO). At Carnival 2026, TUCO president Ainsley King declared Machel Montano's "Encore" the Road March, played 171 times, ahead of Voice's "Car Behave" and Bunji Garlin's "Roadman".¹⁵ It was Machel's 12th Road March, the most by any artiste in Trinidad and Tobago.¹⁵ He had drawn level with Lord Kitchener's 11 in 2025 with "Pardy".⁷

The Soca Monarch

As soca grew, it got its own crown. The first Soca Monarch final was held on Thursday 11 February 1993 at The Spectrum in Port of Spain, created by the Carnival Judges Association and William Munro's Prestige Production. Twenty-nine acts competed, including Sparrow and Shadow, and SuperBlue won with "Bacchanal Time".¹⁶ The contest became the International Soca Monarch in 1996, and from 2005 it added a separate Groovy category alongside the Power one.¹⁷ In 2016-2018, when the two categories were merged into one, Voice (Aaron St. Louis) won the crown three years running.¹⁷

Soca's many flavours

Power soca is the faster, more aggressive, jump-and-wave style that drives the big bands on the road.¹³ Groovy soca slows the tempo and leans into melody and wining, the songs you sing along to with a drink in hand.

Chutney soca is soca blended with chutney, the Indo-Trinidadian music tradition, using English and Hindustani lyrics and instruments such as the dholak, harmonium, tabla and dhantal. Drupatee Ramgoonai named the style on her 1987 album, and the Chutney Soca Monarch competition has crowned champions since 1996.¹⁸

Ragga soca mixes soca with the deejay style of Jamaican ragga and dancehall. The NCC lists it among the major categories of modern calypso, and Bunji Garlin, the "Viking of Soca", is one of its best-known voices.^{1 19}

Bouyon comes from Dominica, where it grew in the late 1980s from older Dominican rhythms.²⁰ Bouyon soca blends the two. Soca itself is now a regional conversation: in 2019 the Road March went to "Famalay", a collaboration between Vincentian artist Skinny Fabulous, Machel Montano and Bunji Garlin.^{13 7}

The modern stars

• Machel Montano first won the Road March in 1997 with "Big Truck" and has since become the most successful Road March artist in history, with his 12th title in 2026.^{21 15}
• Bunji Garlin ruled Carnival 2013 with "Differentology", a soca and EDM crossover that a Major Lazer remix took to festivals around the world.¹³ He has won the Soca Monarch several times, including 2004, 2005 and 2008.^{19 17}
• Kes (Kes the Band) had their first big Carnival hit with "Wotless" in 2011, and their 2018 single "Hello" became the most streamed soca song of its decade, with over 70 million combined YouTube and Spotify streams by 2023.¹³
• Destra Garcia, the "Queen of Bacchanal", turned her wild-child alter ego into an anthem with "Lucy" in 2015.^{13 22}
• Patrice Roberts from Toco shared the 2006 Road March with Machel Montano on "Band of the Year", and scored again with "Mind My Business" in 2022.^{23 13}
• Nailah Blackman, granddaughter of Ras Shorty I, honoured her family's legacy with "More Sokah" in 2020.^{24 13}
• Voice (Aaron St. Louis) won the Soca Monarch from 2016 to 2018 and released the anthem "Long Live Soca" in 2023, the year soca turned 50.^{17 13}

Hear it for yourself

The best way to understand this music is to hear it in its home. Catch a calypso tent show for the wit and the politics, stand by a judging point on Carnival Tuesday to feel the Road March race, and then go to a fete and let a groovy tune and a power tune show you the difference in your own feet.