The Montserrat Arts Council (MAC) has updated its 2019 carnival schedule, which was originally released to the public on Monday, the 13th May 2019.
The new schedule was released today Friday, the 13th September 2019, 98 days until the launch of Carnival 2019, and follows the recent appointment of the Director of MAC – Mr. Kenneth Silcott and the new Head of Planning and Production – Ms. Vernaire Bass.
The new team has updated the schedule after several meetings with key stakeholders to review and address issues that include private promotions, the Calypso and Soca Monarch competitions, the Miss Montserrat competition, marketing, prize monies and the format of the various competitions during carnival.
In the interest of providing the best possible program for visitors and local patrons, they have made the following amendments to the schedule:
They have removed the ‘100th Day Countdown’ event, which was scheduled to take place on Saturday, 14th September 2019.
They have changed the name of the event that was originally called the ‘Queen’s Court’ to the ‘Sashing Ceremony for Miss Montserrat 2019’ and moved the date forward from the 23rd November 2019 to the 26th October 2019.
They have removed two of the ‘Booth Competitions’ (the 6th and the 20th of December 2019), so now there is only one ‘Booth Competition’ taking place in the carnival village on the 13th December 2019.
They have also removed the ‘Calypso Eliminations’ event on the 30th November, so now there is only one ‘Calypso Eliminations’ event and it will take place on the 7th December 2019. The ‘Calypso Semi-finals’ will take place on the 21st December 2019 and the ‘Calypso Finals’ will take place on the 29th December 2019.
They have also moved forward the ‘Opening of Carnival’ to the 20th December 2019 instead of the 21st of December 2019, so that carnival starts on a Friday like it has always done in the past. So, the ‘Regional Junior Calypso’ show is taking place after the ‘Opening of Carnival’.
They have swapped around the dates of the ‘Calypso Finals’ and the ‘Regional Female Calypso Show’, so the ‘Regional Female Calypso Show’ now takes place on the 30th December 2019.
They have completely removed the ‘Prince Charming Show’ that was scheduled to take place on the 23rd December 2019 and ‘Powdah’ that was scheduled to take place on the 31st December from the calendar, as the both promoters no longer wish to host their events in 2019.
They have also added ‘T-shirt Mas’ to the ‘St. John’s Day’ celebration, which takes place annually on the 27th December.
The MAC team believes that the changes to the Carnival schedule this year, is a step in the right direction towards placing Montserrat’s carnival on a competitive footing with carnivals across the region.
The carnival schedule is still in a draft format and may be updated once again, as promoters continue to fine tune their plans for the carnival.
Updates and information about the schedule will be posted on the Montserrat Arts Council’s Facebook page and the Montserrat Annual Festival Facebook page as they become available.