Carnival planners have noted the importance of Vincy Mas to this country’s economy and have called on its marketers to not let their guards down.
Dennis Ambrose, chair of the Carnival Development Corporation (CDC) said Thursday that other countries are capitalising on Vincy Mas marketing tools.
“Carnival remains a major marketing tool for any country, as I am sure everyone will notice from television advertising that many, many countries use these types of national cultural festivals to bring visitors to their shores,” he told the prize-giving ceremony for Vincy Mas 2013.
“ We should be no different. Much of our economy still depends on the next visitor who comes here and has to buy food, rent accommodations, rent vehicles, go to restaurants, purchase our arts and crafts, hire people to assist with their needs — the possibilities are endless,” Ambrose further stated.
“I say this to remind the sources which are established to assist with the marketing of Carnival, that this is not the time to drop our guard. We have to maintain such a pace, that other territories will continue to copy-cat and capitalize on our ideas in order to sell their carnival product. “
He said other countries are willing to pump more funds into marketing their carnivals, using our Vincy Mas tools “because they see a good thing, and they aim to overtake us and could eventually crowd us out of our placement as the hottest carnival, and that could happen if we fail to put a bigger thrust on marketing this spectacular festival of ours.
“It is a well established fact, that in order to make money, we must be prepared to spend some money to market our festivals in a powerful way,” Ambrose further stated.
The CDC said EC$600,000 in prizes was distributed this year.
Dennis Ambrose and CDC needs to have their heads examined. It is not only the Mas marketers that needs to continue to innovate…, but CDC also.
Mr. Ambrose cant be serious when he utters all those cute phrases like the hottest carnival in the Caribbean…pleased with the outcome overall… The production of our shows met the expectation of the patrons. They were well executed with good time management,…who are you fooling Dennis? Not me!
As a musician, and former participant in the art-form, living abroad. Ive always made an effort to record the Calypso Monarch competition via the live Internet broadcast, for further enjoyment, analysis, and study. This Ive been doing for the past couple of years.
Year after years its the same crap. Shoddy performance from the backing bands; brass and horn instruments out of tune, poor intonations, rhythm section struggling to keep up with the whole performance, mistakes after mistakes… I can go on and on.
In other words, these musicians are certainly not qualified to represent the calypsonians and particularly their songs; that are still making some good efforts to bring forward their best, under the circumstances. They deserve better treatment Mr. Ambrose.
I am under the impression that Dennis havent listened to these broadcasts at all, and probably have closed his ears to any criticism, from any front whatsoever.
Well he needs to pay more attention. Go back and listen to the past performances, see for yourself where we stand in comparison to others. See if we dont sound like a bunch of eight (8) graders having their first go at a concert performance for their peers.
These broadcast shows, are way below acceptable standards, almost to the point of embarrassing. These things cant be disputed. It is already out there for all to witness. We are not looked upon as seasoned professionals, organizers and planners… and bear in mind the magnitude of these shows, citing their National characteristics. These are supposedly the biggest shows in the whole scheme of things…and we are exposed to such nonsense? Then what can be expected of SVG as a whole?
Do something about this Dennis, do it now, or step aside and let others who are better qualified to steer CDC in the right direction take charge.
As the saying goes the buck stops here. CDC must take full responsibility.
Moreover, not much can be said in terms of implementation and preparedness for such shows. The results are the outcome of lack of preparations, lack of concern, and downright disinterest.
In short, “to fail to prepare is to prepare to fail”. We need to do better than this. The world is listening and watching via the web, to SVG…nothing to be proud of.
This going out to CDC, I aggre with Mr Peter Knight , I also have been an active band mamber of Asterisks band and have backed up many calypsoians back in t he early eighties and I remember My self on (trumpet) and( Dinston Young) on trumbone, masking up the Lyric Cinema and looking at the crowd having fun and giving us incouraging words about how marverlous the horns sound, we use to rehears at least twice a week when it come to calaypsoians because we want it to sound at its best, I remember I I lived in town but because we wanted the band to sound gooe and the best,we would stay of over night and practic long hours.
The standard of the musician home is not very high atol, Peter is right,? where is Mr Peters who use to compose and play trumpet for years with the calpsoians in tents back then helping us with the Musical Phrasing of the music, lets take back the music where and what is use to besometimes I would play in two bands and just because we had the horn lines so acturate, dinnis look there is really good Musician living out here, who are born Vincentain and willing to come home and partisepate in the Carnival and development of carnival, so lets work together and make this a big success, for our country and younger chrildren, let bring back live music and brass band on the road, so when people hear a peace of music playing with horn part they will jump and be proud of it.
Well he needs to pay more attention. Go back and listen to the past performances, see for yourself where we stand in comparison to others. See if we dont sound like a bunch of eight (8) graders having their first go at a concert performance for their peers. Mr
PKnight is right with this go back and listen to band like Clymax and Asterisks back in the day backing up calypsians, you will hear quality sounding bands trust me. (big up to P Knight) resp[ect due: to all thos ewho were back in the day leave your coment. dont for get Mr Denstan Yooung) the Trumbone player for Asterisks.
Godfrey Mack: ( respect)
I agree with Peter, as an active and old musician , a proud vincy who love folk culture and Calypsos , I am disappointed with the musicians in the calypso tent, lots of times they are off key. We need to sell SVG more professionally on the internet radio with these shows.