(L to R) Fashion designer Robert Young of The Cloth with Wendell Manwarren and Roger Roberts of Trinidad and Tobago rapso band 3canal. Wendell and Roger are wearing jackets Robert designed for their upcoming tour of India.
Caribbean Free Radio #51 is a command performance of sorts recorded at Little House, home of 2/3 of my house band 3canal. I was summoned there last night to talk with Wendell Manwarren and Roger Roberts about their upcoming tour of India.
Also discussed: Roger’s participation in the New York City Marathon (bib #18722, in case you’re interested) this coming Sunday! I’ve just signed up with the Marathon’s Athlete Alert service so I can track Roger’s progress on race day.
I’ve had the iPhone application Audioboo for some time, but it was only today that I finally got around to using it for the first time. It’s a slick little microblogging app that lets you use the iPhone to record audio files of up to three minutes and publish them to the Audiobooweb site, where others can listen, comment and indicate their favour/disfavour by clicking on the thumbs-up/thumbs-down icons.
Because cell phones mics are optimised for capturing the human voice, the files Audioboo records are of pretty good quality. The app’s truly winning feature, however, is its simplicity: hit “record” —> put phone to ear and speak —> garnish with optional title, metadata, image —> hit “publish”. The other audio microblogging services I’ve played with all involved dialing in to phone numbers (that were usually international long distance for me) and other rigmaroles.
The downside to Audioboo is that in order to record a “boo” you need an iPhone, at least for now. (Another downside is that the recordings are called “boos”, though who would ever have dreamt that the word “tweet” would come to roll off the tongue in as it does today?)
Will Audioboo rekindle the podcasting fire in me? Hard to tell. But here are my first two boos, and two images to illustrate them. If I decide to boo further, you’ll find the lot archived here.
Episode #6 arrives a day late courtesy of the carnival week frenzy, which is not to say the show is without substance. Au contraire: in the final episode in the cut+clear carnival 2009 series, the members of 3canal and I visit with photographer, carnival connoisseur and Belmont native Jeffrey Chock at his home on Clifford Street for a chat about the carnival of yesteryear, the philosophical underpinnings of the changes taking place in today’s version of the festival, and—naturally—the experience of photographing one of the world’s most visually spectacular events.
This week’s 3canal track: “Paradise” remixed by Keshav Chandradath Singh
Trust the cut+clear carnival podcast’s most freewheeling and raucous show to date to be the one featuring women (it’s also the first CFR episode to feature explicit language!). In episode #5 the members of 3canal and I sit down backstage at Queen’s Hall with Cecilia Salazar, Dionne McNicol and Elisha Bartels, three key members of the 3canal Show, and discuss matters ranging from performing while pregnant to the banning of songs featuring “daggerin’” from the Jamaican airwaves. We also remember the late, great John Isaacs, the fourth member of 3canal, on the ninth anniversary of his passing.
Previews of this year’s edition of the 3canal Show begin on Thursday 12 February, 2009 at Queen’s Hall, Port of Spain, Trinidad. The full run begins on Monday 16 February.
This week’s 3canal track: “Where Do We Go From Here” from the album “Joy+Fire”
cut+clear carnival episode #4 takes us to Belmont, a community rich in carnival history, where we visit with Glendon Morris at the Belmont Jewels mas’ camp for a chat about the ups and downs of making traditional, hand-crafted mas’ in an age of mass production, the allure of playing fancy sailor and working with his late father, the legendary master metal craftsman, designer and bandleader, Ken Morris.
Stanton Kewley, Pelham Goddard and Wendell Manwarren at Pelham’s home in St. James, Trinidad
In cut+clear carnival episode #3 we visit veteran producer and steel orchestra arranger, Pelham Goddard, at his home in St. James for a chat about the evolution of music for steel orchestras and 3canal’s foray into the steel band arena with Pelham and the Exodus Steel Orchestra. In addition, Wendell treats us to a series of audio vignettes explaining certain aspects of the steel band scene in Trinidad and Tobago.
On episode #2 of the cut+clear carnival podcast 3canal and I chat with Curtis “C*POP” Popplewell and Walt Lovelace, the men behind the Beach House Carnival fête and some of the country’s most original music video work.
Tune in to hear Curtis and Walt hold forth on why they prefer not to be referred to as fête promoters and the state of music video production in the country.
This week’s 3canal track: “Joy+Fire”, from the album of the same name.
For the 2009 carnival season I’ve teamed up with 3canal to produce a series of down and dirty (dutty?) podcasts called cut+clear carnival. We’re keeping it deliberately simple and free-flowing: the plan is for us to meet on Mondays, riff for 15 or so minutes on things carnival-related, preferably with a guest, then have the show edited and uploaded by Tuesday.
In this pilot episode Roger Roberts and Wendell Manwarren of 3canal shoot the breeze with MPC wizard Keshav Chandradath Singh of the cut+clear crew and Canboulay.
See you at the launch of 3canal’s 2009 release, Joy+Fire, on Sunday 19 January at 6pm at the Queen’s Hall Courtyard, Port of Spain, Trinidad!
Nearly four years later, CFR finally hits the half-century. For show #50 I return to the place where it all began—cut+clear productions, headquarters of CFR’s “house band”, 3canal, for a leisurely chat with Wendell, Roger and Stanton about “Boom Up History“, the music track they’re giving away for free on Trinidadtunes.com, life on the road and the making of Joy + Fire, their 2009 release.
And here’s the Boom Up History video, filmed and directed by Walt Lovelace.
In this long overdue show, which was recorded way back in June, I interview Lisa Allen-Agostini, co-editor, with Jeanne Mason, of Trinidad Noir, the latest in the Noir series published by Akashic Books.
Apologies to Chris Abani and Yusef Komunyakaa for omitting mention of their fine readings on Friday night. At the time of the recording we were still recovering from Derek Walcott’s unforgettable premiere reading of “The Mongoose”, a “tribute” to V S Naipaul that begins with the choice lines, “I have been bitten/I must avoid infection/Or else I’ll be dead as Naipaul’s fiction,” and goes either downhill or uphill from there, depending on your point of view. Being good bacchanal-loving Caribbeans, we naturally devote a section of our review to discussion of that episode.
Thomas Glave at Calabash 2008
Following our review is a far more coherent interview with Jamaican writer Thomas Glave, who talks about his latest work, Our Caribbean: A Gathering of Lesbian and Gay Writing from the Antilles. Thomas was also kind enough to send me a copy of the statement with which he prefaced his reading at Calabash on opening night:
"I want to say a special thanks to the Calabash organisers – Colin Channer, Kwame Dawes, and Justine Henzell – for inviting me back to Calabash, this being my second reading at the festival, and for their unceasing generosity to, and support of, writers from around the world. And so, mindful of that generosity and kindness, my conscience will not permit me to begin reading from this book in particular before I say that as a gay man of Jamaican background I am appalled and outraged by the Prime Minister’s having said only three days ago on BBC-TV that homosexuals will not have any place in his Cabinet and, implicitly, by extension, in Jamaica. I guess this means that there will never be any room in Mr Golding’s Cabinet for me and for the many, many other men and women in Jamaica who are homosexual. And so I now feel moved to say directly to Mr Golding that it is exactly this kind of bigotry and narrow-mindedness that Jamaica does not need any more of, and that you, Mr Golding, should be ashamed of yourself for providing such an example of how not to lead Jamaica into the future. And so, Mr Golding, think about how much you are not helping Jamaica the next time you decide to stand up and say that only some Jamaicans – heterosexuals, in this case – have the right to live in their country as full citizens with full human rights, while others – homosexuals – do not. That is not democracy. That is not humane leadership. That is simply the stupidity and cruelty of bigotry."
In episode #47 I drop in on CFR’s house band, 3canal, to chat with Roger Roberts and Wendell Manwarren about last week’s ReThePublic concert; the band’s upcoming appearance at the WOMEX world music festival in Seville, Spain; and how 3canal learned to stop worrying and love Facebook.
In the pages of CFR she’s known as “the Dread”, but to most other people Atillah Springer is a Trinidadian journalist, activist and blogger and a member of a protest movement which, earlier this year, succeeded in driving the aluminium industry giant Alcoa out of a community in rural Trinidad where they had proposed to establish a smelter under somewhat dubious circumstances.
In this podcast I talk with Atillah about the movement’s use of the Internet in their organising activities.
Dare we say that CFR the podcast is back? Episode #45 arrives complete with cheap gimmickry and, fortunately, a bit of substance provided by the members of CFR’s house band, 3canal, whom we visit during a rehearsal of the repeat performance of this year’s edition of The 3canal Show at Queen’s Hall in Port of Spain, Trinidad.
Listen to the podcast by using the player at the bottom of the post or access it using any of these methods: Download MP3 | RSS | iTunes
Tuesday January 30th 2007, 8:00 am
Filed under: Podcast Posted by: Georgia
Over the weekend I listened to a few old episodes of CFR (I know what you’re saying: who is she trying to kid? All CFR episodes are old) and started thinking about which ones might be my favourites. And so I figured I’d throw the question out to you: Which are your favourite episodes of CFR? And why?
For your convenience I’ve embedded a little flash player in this post so you can scroll through from the early cringeworthies to the later ones where I sound like I know a little more about what I’m doing, all without leaving the page.
You people are right — I need to do more podcasts. Earlier this evening I uploaded the fourth edition of The Global Voices Show. The damn thing took me almost the entire weekend to produce. Nor would I describe it as a technical masterpiece. My podcasting muscles have turned to mush.
Here it is anyway, warts and all (and show notes here).
“It’s quite an exciting little thing,” Wendell Manwarren of 3canal told me over the phone yesterday as we discussed “Caribeana Imperia“, the show the band has been preparing over the past few weeks in Washington DC. That’s almost certainly an understatement. “Caribeana Imperia” opened on Thursday 13 July and from all reports audiences had no difficulty getting into the groove.
In CFR #44 the three members of 3canal — Wendell, Roger and Stanton — and choreographer Dave Williams fill me in on the details over the telephone from their DC headquarters.
“Caribeana Imperia” runs at the Gala Hispanic Theatre in Washington DC from Thursday-Sunday until July 30. The show is directed by Hugo Medrano and Wendell Manwarren.
Please consider supporting us by buying a CFR t-shirt, and if you’re an Amazon.com shopper, you can also support CFR by initating your purchases by clicking on any of the Amazon.com links on the site.
You can listen to both versions (MP3 and Enhanced AAC) of the show by using the embedded player above, but for show notes and links please check out the post over at Global Voices. (Hint: the AAC version is smaller and prettier).
Wednesday May 31st 2006, 1:58 am
Filed under: Podcast Posted by: Georgia
Nikipedia and I racked our brains to figure out a catchy way to open “Global Voices, Caribbean Accents”, the roundtable we’ll be leading in a few hours’ time at the National Library. The roundtable is part of the programme of the Caribbean Studies Assocation’s annual conference, which is taking place this year here in Trinidad, and will address, as Nikipedia puts it on his blog, “the current and potential roles of blogging and other forms of participative web media in the Caribbean.”
Then yesterday evening it hit us: what better way to demonstrate the potential of the Internet than by opening with a podcast composed of the voices of some the people [we hope will be] in the audience? In other words, by putting our audience on the Internet, even before they’ve become our audience. So yesterday morning found us down at the Crowne Plaza hotel, getting as as many conference delegates as we could pin down to answer the question: “What does the term “Caribbean” mean to you?”
And here is the result: CFR #43, roundtable opener in the guise of a CFR podcast. Hope you enjoy what our audience has to say.
Play the podcast using this nifty little online player:
Please consider supporting us by buying a CFR t-shirt, and if you’re an Amazon.com shopper, you can also support CFR by initating your purchases by clicking on any of the Amazon.com links on the site.
Caribbean Free Radio #51 - 3canal: Dreaming of India [19:13m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (449)
In the pages of CFR she’s known as “the Dread”, but to most other people Atillah Springer is a Trinidadian journalist, activist and 
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, an anthology edited by Kei. Purchase Kei’s short story collection, Fear of Stones, from 
