The 1953 Dial Records of Carnival Music in Trinidad
a paper to be delivered at the annual meetings of
The American Folklore Society
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
on October 17, 1996
Donald R. Hill, Professor of
Anthropology and Chair, Africana/Latino Studies
SUNY - Oneonta, NY 13820
607-436-2018 email
DRAFT
There were probably more calypsonians being recorded in the 1945-1955 period than in the previous decade. The difference was that the initiative was divided between several small ventures, and the overall distribution of calypsoes was substantially smaller than during the Decca years. This is why it is today easier to find the calypsoes of the thirties than those of the late forties to mid-fifties; particularly those which were recorded and distributed in Trinidad. . .
Future researchers of the Calypso will, no doubt, seek to fill this substantial gap in our knowledge; a gap that has created the false impression that there was a break in the continuity of the Calypso tradition. . . . (Gordon Rohlehr, Calypso & Society in Pre-Independence Trinidad, self-published in Trinidad, 1990, Pg. 524.)
When Aubrey “Bolo” Christopher, of Christopher Brothers Cycle and Radio Services, 7 Nelson Street, Port of Spain, Trinidad, met with Ross Russell, President and sole owner of Dial Records of New York, to record calypsos, steelband music, and other Carnival and religious music in late February and early March 1953, they ushered in a new era in the commercialization of Trinidad’s Carnival music.[1] The Dial 10” long playing albums were the first LPs recorded in Trinidad. They were marketed in the United States where a steady supply of 78rpm records and a couple of long playing records by Trinidadians, North Americans of West Indian descent, and other North Americans fed a calypso boom that had been incubating since the late 1930s. In Trinidad, Christopher marketed some of the DIAL recordings on the red 78rpm Calypso label. Christopher and Edouard Sa Gomes were the only Trinidadians making records between 1950 and 1954 and few other recordings were made between the end of World War II and the middle 1950s when the Mighty Sparrow burst on the scene. The Dial recordings presaged the successful recordings made by Emory Cook later in the 1950s and by Telco and RCA beginning in the 1960s. I will present a brief history of the DIAL calypso records, review the circumstances of the recordings, and briefly mention the musicians, calypsonians, and styles of music recorded on DIAL.
In 1937 the Radio Corporation of American (RCA) set up a recording studio in the then new St. James Theatre (Port of Spain) in order to cut calypso records for their Bluebird label.[2] The first major recording project in Trinidad after World War II took place in this studio in 1947. According to Christopher, “this group of fellas come down from the States to do this recording but it was never sold in Trinidad. They recorded in St. James.”[3] The 1947 session was sponsored by Continental Records, a New York based outfit that had recorded or re-issued a lot of ethnic music in the United States. They issued about 15 of the Trinidad recordings and none sold very well.[4]
In 1949 the BBC made a non-commercial Christmas recording by calypsonians Lion, Tiger, and Invader called “Christmas Day Calypso” as well as an instrumental by the Perseverence Club Band.[5]
In 1950 recording efforts picked up considerably. The BBC made a couple more recordings and a visiting North American tourist, John Bessor, recorded calypsonians, a backup band, and the Woodbrook Invaders Steel Orchestra in Lord Invader’s Calypso Club.[6] Edouard Sa Gomes begin his own label, “Sa Gomes,”[7] which was eventually to run to at least 180 78rpm records.[8] And Aubrey Christopher began his first furtive attempt at recording on the Christo label.
There were no known recordings cut in Trinidad in 1951 but in December 1952 H. Ramón Fortune, also known as “Popo Arindell,” recorded “speech and vocal effects” and a folk tale for the BBC. (A few months later he would record an entire 10” LP for Christopher and Russell.) In fact, the BBC made extensive recordings in Trinidad and in nearby Carriacou this year in a quantity on par with the subsequent DIAL recordings. Finally, Sa Gomes continued recording on his own label.
This sets the stage for 1953, when the DIAL recordings were made. An announcement of the recording project was printed in the Trinidad Sunday Guardian.
Both the New York distributors of Dial records and Mr. Christopher have the greatest faith in the sales potential. Calypso records are in great demand now, they have found.
The records will carry a special “Calypso” label, with a map of Trinidad. “This will mean that they sell themselves,” says Mr. Christopher. “Tourists are always skeptical that calypso records processed by foreign companies are not authentic.”[9]
Ross Russell, President, owner of DIAL, had owned a record store in southern California and was a jazz enthusiast. He had made legendary recordings of bopster Charlie Parker and others in 1949. Early in 1953 Russell was based in New York City and decided to go to Trinidad on a whim:
It sorta happened by accident. I was living in New York . . . and my close friend was New York editor of Ebony magazine [Alan Morrison]. He was planning to go to Trinidad for the international cricket, the world finals between the West Indies and the Indian team. . . and he talked me into coming with him. . .
This was the period of - the big hit in America was “Rum and Coca Cola.”[10] But when I got down there I felt it was very much of an indigenous culture - folk songs - and I started going in the tents [arenas where calypsos were sung before Carnival]. . .
So the way I got into the recording end of it, there was a man named Christopher. . . He had a little. . .store selling electrical goods and he also had a big table of calypso records; he had a small recording studio with old antiquated equipment.[11] So when I started thinking about recording some of this stuff, I talked to him and we formed a kind of verbal contract. . . . So I saw the carnival and was fascinated by it. . . I ended up staying over quite a while, … I think, pretty nearly two months.[12]
Aubrey Christopher ran the Christopher Brothers Cycle and Radio Services with his brother. Born in Trinidad in 1911, he grew up on Nelson Street where his father, a Trinidadian of Chinese descent, owned a “Chinese Shop,” a grocery and notions store at 70 Nelson Street. His father also owned a yard on Nelson where tents were set up for Carnival calypso competitions.[13] Aubrey’s mother was a Venezuelan creole.
After the close of World War II calypso was very popular, both at home in Trinidad and in the United States. During the War the steelband had developed and although outdoor Carnival was outlawed for the duration, the calypso tents thrived with heavy GI patronage. Lord Invader’s “Rum and Coca Cola” became very popular and when it was copyrighted by Morey Amsterdam and two other North Americans and released by the Andrews Sisters, it became a monster hit. Invader won his case for being the true author of the lyrics to the song and opened a calypso club in Port of Spain for tourists.
Christopher had watched the recording process at the St. James when Continental cut a few 78s in 1947. With skills as a bike mechanic and radio repairman, he thought he could cut records himself. So in 1950 he built his studio at 7 Nelson Street and began to record calypsonians, including Spoiler, Terror, Lady Iere, the Mighty Killer, and possibly Nat Hepburn on the Christo label.[14] “In those days in Trinidad we didn’t have electric phonographs. . . .you wind it up. So the speed, we had to do 78s. We didn’t have a means of playing LPs”[15]
Christopher made the historic DIAL recordings in the same studio. The building is still standing. He says that when international record mogul and founder of ICE Records Eddie Grant visited him a few years ago, he laughed at the small size of the studio and the British equipment upon which the acetates were cut. Says Russell, the studio was “no bigger than a double toilet. There was a lot of reverberations. And so we did the steel drums. . . outside. . . “[16] All but the steel band recordings were made within the studio. Christopher sat in another room where he kept his office and where he had the recording equipment set up. He could see what was going on through a small window. But although the studio itself posed problems, Christopher knew his trade and had purchased the best British 78rpm equipment (John Cowley: personal communication).
In this little studio some of the most significant commercial records early 1950s in Trinidad were recorded:
YOU TOO CAN DANCE
TO THE RHYTHM OF
THE LATEST DIAL
CALYPSO
AND
STEEL BAND
RECORDINGS
‘RECORDED IN TRINIDAD’
78 RPM & 33 1/3 RPM
MFG AND DISTRIBUTED BY
DIAL RECORDING COMPANY (Trinidad)
7 NELSON STREET PORT OF-SPAIN TRINIDAD B.W.I.
MAIL ORDERS PROMPTLY ATTENDED TO[17]
In addition to recording some of the most important calypsonians of the era, Christopher and Russell recorded steelbands, Orisha music, a string band, and a bamboo band. Let’s first look at the calypsonians. There was Small Island Pride, Wonder, Growler, Zebra, Panther (Russell’s favorite), Spoiler, Blakie, Viper, Terror, Wonder, Young Kitchener, Comma, and Dictator. Accompanying these singers were Frankie Francis and his Calypso Devils, McClean’s Calypso Kings, Tommy Gomez Calypso band, Jules Louis and His Hot Six, and the Dial Calypso Orchestra. Many of the big hits of 1953 Carnival were put on record, including 1953 Calypso Monarch winner Spoiler’s his new songs “Beg Bug” and “What the Scientist Say,”[18] Viper’s “White People’s Bacchanal,” Growler’s last song, “Woman Taxi Driver,” Dictator’s “Honesty Best Policy, Panther’s “Taxi Driver,” Blakie’s “Steelband Clash,” Small Island Pride’s “Letter From Executor,”[19] and many others.
Russell and Christopher gathered together calypsonians from two successful calypso tents: Terror, Spoiler, Viking, Wonder, and Zebra from the Young Brigade Tent on St. Vincent Street and Small Island Pride, Panther, Young Kitchener, and Viper from the Old Brigade Tent, which was renamed the Elite Coronation Tent, in honor of the coming coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, at 65 Henry Street. They cut Growler’s last records shortly before he died, as Gordon Rohlehr writes, “obeah-haunted.”[20] Some of the senior tent greats from the Old Brigade were conspicuously absent. They included, at one time or another, Executor (who died in poverty in 1953), Atilla, Invader, and Tiger. For the most part, the Old Brigade consisted of a group of singers that had recorded for Decca in the 1930s and included two generations of calypsonians, singers whose recordings were very popular outside Trinidad but whose popularity within the island was fading. Also, it may have been that these calypsonians owed allegiance to Sa Gomes. Although Christopher and Russell missed a few contemporary singers - most notably Melody - the young entrepreneurs taste in calypso was on the cutting edge of local calypso fashion.
Several steelbands recorded. They were the Funland Steelband, the Johannesburg Fascinators, the All Stars including Neville Jules and his “Hot Ping Pong,” and the Sun Valley Steelband (who accompanied Blakie in “Steelband Clash”). As one of the creators of the kittle, ping pong, and the tune boom, Jules was a true pan innovator.[21] He came out of Hell Yard on a bank of East Dry River and like other panmen from Hell Yard, was a member of the (Trinidad) All Stars band. This pan band was known for its “bomb” tunes, classical and other pieces that they would drop like a bomb on juvay to surprise and impress the competition.[22]
The early 1950s was a rough time for the steelbands and pan men. Following a successful tour of England and France by TASPO (Trinidad All Star Percussion Orchestra], the first chromatically tuned pan band. Still, 1953 was not many years after the steelband clashes of the late 1940s and 1950, the year of a steelband ?meute immortalized by Lord Blakie in "Steelband Clash:"
It was a bacchanal
1950 Carnival
Tokyo and Invaders just below
And when the two band clash
Mamayo! If you see cutlass
Never me again
To jump up in a steelband in Port of Spain.[23]
After the pre-Lenten Carnival and Christopher and Russell had completed their recordings there was another brief carnival, the Coronation Carnival in June honoring Queen Elizabeth II.[24] There were eight steelband clashes and several hundred people were injured. One person was killed, having gotten out of his car in the middle of a steelband fight. He was beaten to death when he was hit with a baseball bat. The riots erupted when there were high levels of post War unemployment and rivalries between grass roots and middle class bands were intense. For several years the Trinidad Guardian, defender of middle class values, railed against the bands. I mention all this because the Dial recordings took place right in the middle of the changing image of pan and other Carnival and Afro-Trinidadian arts and culture.