Foreday morning jam bands are feeling the pressure from the increase in jouvert events being held on August 3.
Although the number of registered bands is up, spokesperson for the Foreday Morning collective Bryan Worrell said there could be a decline in the number of revellers.
“The number of bands does not equate to the number of people that these bands will get, so although there is interest from a promotion standpoint in terms of how many bands want to participate, the actual response for Foreday is down based on the numbers that bands are getting. It’s down all across the board,” he told a Nation team on Wednesday.
He confirmed this after some Foreday bandleaders expressed dissatisfaction that the national event was now competing with more similar jump-ups.
Neon Carnival Jouvert, Native Foreday, Mix Nutz Foreday Jam, Island Mas: I’m Up Dutty Road Jam and Caesar’s Army’s A.M.BUSH are the other jouvert parties scheduled to be held just around 1 a.m. on August 3.
“The influx of private jumps of the same night is hurting it for sure. Several prominent brands that have events on the market are teaming up and they have a bigger base of clients that they can get to their events, so it is hurting the one-off promoters that do a band once a year,” he added.
Worrell, who is also Colorz Entertainment’s bandleader, said they normally would cater to 1 000 people on Foreday Morning but estimated it will now be about 800.
While not against the competition, he questioned whether similar situations occurred at other regional festivals.
Tropical Splash Foreday’s bandleader Randolph “Woodie” Woodroffe said although he was not against promoters staging external events, they should not compete with Foreday.
“Crop Over is we thing and I feel the private jumps should be addressed. If they want to do their private jumps, do their private thing two weeks before [Kadooment] or later in the year. They have all sorts of time to do their private jumps,” he lamented.
He said they were hoping to take between 200 and 250 revellers on the road.
At the launch of Kooyman Foreday Morning Jam last Saturday at Kooyman, Kendall Hill, Christ Church, corporate communications specialist at the National Cultural Foundation (NCF) Toni Yarde said there had been a steady increase in the number of Foreday bands since 2019.
“From around 2019, we had 29 registered bands on the road. Last year we had 33 registered bands and this year we have 39 to date, so you can see the growth over the years.
“That is a good thing for Foreday Morning as an event because there are lots of private events on that day. Even with the influx of private events, Foreday Morning is still holding its own,” Yarde said.
Founder of Caesar’s Army, Jules Sobion, recalled that when they first hosted A.M.BUSH Bim for the first time about a decade ago, they were not attempting to impact the national event.
In a recent interview, he said they did participate in Foreday but were hoping to elevate their own customers’ experience.
“One of the first events that Caesar’s Army participated in was Foreday Morning, for about two years; we were a section of a band. At that time we were creating the AMBUSH product in Trinidad and Barbados was the first place that we exported it.
“I don’t want to say it was a bad experience, but we could have elevated the experience by doing our own thing. There were plenty of persons storming; persons were not masqueraders infiltrating your band.”
Sobion added: “When we did that in Barbados, it was a big uproar, ‘These Trinidad and Tobagonians coming here doing their own thing. You know, you can’t do that.’
“It wasn’t the light that we wanted because we thought we were just concentrating on our consumers and elevating their experience. However, it set a path for even domestic stakeholders to do that and now there’s an influx of outside jumps.”
Christopher Williams, of SALT Foreday Band, acknowledged that the external events could have an impact on their numbers but said he was not against competition.
“Yes, [private events] may have an impact on some of the Foreday bands, but I think the two can coexist as long as they carve out their own niche,” he said.
Williams said while the numbers were down, he questioned whether the crime situation had an impact or the last-minute nature of Barbadians was a contributor. However, Worrell said: “Nobody has told me that the violence is not why ‘I don’t want to jump this year’ because the numbers had been down prior to
this upsurge.”
