BLACK MAN PARTY

Nov 10, 2008 Features / Columnists, Tony Deyal column

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Tonight the black man come out to party
Tonight the black man come out to jam, jam, jam
Tonight the black man feeling to boogie woogie
Have a little fun…

This could be about Obama on the night of Tuesday, November 4, 2008, when he became President-elect of the United States of America (USA).  However, there are other people who will write about Obama, a whole bunch of them.  But even as the festivities began in Grant Park in Chicago, I thought of another black man whose greatness was also recognised in the last two weeks and whose contribution will also endure.

Leroy Calliste, known as “Black Stalin,” received an Honorary Doctorate from the University of the West Indies on Friday, October 31, 2008. 

“Stalin” grew up in San Fernando in South Trinidad.  Our paths first crossed in 1959 – I was going to school in San Fernando and Stalin made his debut at the Southern Brigade Tent, an institution that had given a start to many talented young singers, including the great Lord Shorty (Ras Shorty I) and the Mighty Duke. 

But to get the rewards and recognition, he had to go to Port of Spain.  He did a short stint at the Original Young Brigade (which featured the Calypso King of the World, the Mighty Sparrow), and then went to Lord Kitchener’s Tent, the Calypso Revue.  Kitch decided the young man had some promise and named him “The Mighty Stalin.” 

In those days, Lords, Ladies and Mighties of Calypso abounded — from Atilla to (eventually) Zandolie, with Beginner, Inventor, Sparrow and Superior alphabetically in-between.  The first time I saw Stalin in his new guise, he was a part-time Master of Ceremonies, cracking jokes and singing songs.  He had this infectious, impish grin that would make you want to laugh even before he started his joke. 

In spite of songs like “A Tribute to Kennedy” (1962), you always got the feeling that he was up to something.
Ironically, that something was the calypso that changed his image and showed that, underlying the humour and the insouciance, there was a serious singer willing to comment on the currents and trends of his time. 

“He never lived by a gun, but he died by one…” was the first line of his ‘The Message of Martin Luther King’ (1969).

Suddenly, in the calypso world, he was there or thereabouts.  His social and political awareness deepened and he became Black Stalin.  Sometimes memory mixes up times and places, but there are songs — ideas really — expressed by calypsonians that hit with the force of revelation. 

Behold a pale horse, or a black social commentator, or a man who will change America are phenomena like battering rams on the mind, they force you to sit up and take notice.  Stalin hit us with a curious thought – The Steelband gone, but the Panman stay.  It was an incredible radical concept that here our own instrument and our music were going for “higher” or “hire” to all parts of the world, but the inventor, the player, the “panman” was not going anywhere. 

Stalin also forced Dr. Eric Williams, the Prime Minister, to sit up and take notice when he sang, “All dem oil dollars flowing here, Black Stalin want a share, piece of the action, piece of the action.” 

He called on Williams and all politicians, “Mr. Divider, listen to me, this is man talking to man!” 
There are two incidents embedded in my mind.  It was 1979.  Stalin was breaking down the town with three calypsos: Caribbean Unity (De Caribbean Man), Play One (a tribute to the greats in steelband and Carnival) and More Times.  I was working as the Television Producer in the Office of the Prime Minister (Dr. Eric Williams) in Trinidad. 

In addition to a nightly 15-minute feature, I also produced a thirty-minute current affairs programme that was generally political but sometimes cultural.  The show was aired on Wednesday nights.  I faced a dilemma.  Carnival was on Monday and Tuesday, and Ash Wednesday was my Sabbath.  I needed a programme desperately. 

Two weeks before Carnival Sunday, when the Calypso Monarch competition takes place, I persuaded Stalin to record a programme based on the assumption that he had been crowned Calypso Monarch.  I put him on a set, surrounded by young people asking questions about his views on Caribbean Unity.  What he meant by, “Mr. West Indian politician,/ You say you went to big institution/ So how come you can’t unite/ Seven million?/ For a West Indian Unity/ I know is very easy/ All you have to do is rap to your people/ And tell them like me/ Dat is one race/ From the same place/ Make the same trip/ On the same ship…”

The second incident is a Special Convention of the ruling People’s National Movement.  It turned out to be the last public speech of Dr. Eric Williams before his death in April 1981.  In the middle of a long discourse on history, Dr. Williams, using a literal interpretation of Stalin’s Calypso, waded into the concept of Caribbean Unity propounded by the calypsonian, and produced scholastic evidence to show that it was not the same race, same place, same ship or same trip. 

It was unreal. I met Stalin on a flight some time later, and we spoke about that day.  “Boy Tony,” he said, “I was home and suddenly people start calling me to ask, ‘What you do the man?’ ‘Why he attacking you so?’ and I was in a daze. I had to tell them I didn’t do him anything.” 

Nothing, except teaching the population how to deal with the political vampires, “Keep the chalice burning, vampire passing.”  Nothing, except sticking to the tradition of calypso and living up to his own song, “You can make it if you try, just a little harder.” 

It was nothing more, or less, than a passion for his art and a desire for justice, equality and equity.
*Tony Deyal was last seen wondering whether Stalin would change his name from Leroy to Dr. Erasmus B. Black Stalin.

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