Newly crowned Calypso monarch Gordon ‘Innocent’ Joseph has credited a host of persons including two veteran calypsonians for his success at Sunday night’s calypso monarch competition at the National Stadium at Queen’s Park.
Speaking to THE NEW TODAY, ‘Innocent’ who defeated three former monarchs to win the coveted title singled out Edson “Ajamu” Mitchell and Lloyd “Mr. X” Panchoo for helping him put together the two songs that saw him win the competition.
He said that “Ajamu”, a nine-time calypso monarch winner who is now into gospel music, is the one who arranged both songs for him but was very instrumental in penning “Pan In Glory” for the competition.
He stated that “Mr X” was the main person in writing his other winning hit called “The Party is Mine” which depicted the problems within the New National Party (NNP) in finding a successor for its aging political leader Keith Mitchell.
‘Innocent’ spoke of having the ideas for writing the songs but needed help from “Ajamu” and “Mr. X” in putting together the finished product.
The first time Dimanche Gras winner was delighted with his victory over a field of ten other competitors.
“I’m human and when you are victorious I feel happy, I feel elated and everything. I am really, really happy that at least my name is in Grenada’s history now as the 2024 Calypso Monarch,” he said.
According to ‘Innocent’, he was never undaunted on the night of the competition in which he was facing three former monarchs – ‘Scholar’, ‘Rootsman Kelly’ and ‘Sour Serpent’.
“I have always told fellahs that any time I have two songs that I think that are on par with those guys, I don’t see anyone as a big gun because once my songs are good I have no fear of people on a stage. Being up against three former monarchs didn’t intimidate me at all,” he said.
‘Innocent’ pointed out that he was pretty confident that he could win the crown and was often telling people that he was going to the Dimanche Gras show “to win this thing this year.”
He said that although he was confident of winning the crown he was looking out for several calypsonians on the night of the competition.
“Scholar” is always a threat in a competition because he is a man for the night. I was not so bothered about ‘Rootsman Kelly’. The other persons that I was really looking at was ‘Sour Serpent’ and to a lesser extent Nashanda.
“I was on the lookout for them but to say being fearful or intimidated by them – No. I knew once all went as planned, everything was equal I had a fair chance just as anybody else.”
The first time monarch winner gave an insight into the pan song called “Pan In Glory” that helped him to ramp up the points to impress the judges on the night of the competition.
He said: “I was never a pan fan per say but I always thought that Dimanche Gras was missing something like that. So I had this idea in my head years now – Pan in The Air. The concept was that all those guys who passed on who were in the steelpan fraternity, they kind of formed an orchestra up there.”
“I went up to “Ajamu” to record the first song, “The Party is Mine” and I was telling him – because we have a very good relationship, he is my daddy in Calypso – let’s write a song “Pan in the air” and he said ‘Innocent’ – what’s wrong with you – this time of the year now – I was talking Mid-June – he say ‘Innocent’ I don’t write like that anymore and I don’t have time.”
“I went back another time and I was telling him, Jams, let us do that song. I remember it was a Thursday night, I was up there until after 10 the night working on the other song. He kept saying, “Pan in the air”, he kept repeating that so something told me that he was giving it some thought.”
“When we look at the time, I say time was against us. I left up there the Thursday night and the Friday morning when I woke up and looked at my phone I saw a voice note from “Ajamu” and when I played it he started arranging the song and he asked me if I liked that – I say that is the song I have in mind so he just continued with it and that is how “Pan In Glory” came about.”
Innocent indicated that he intends to continue working with “Ajamu” and “Mr. X” to prepare himself for future Dimanche Gras performances.
Following are the results of the 2024 Calypso Monarch competition:-
Gordon Joseph ‘Innocent’
Finley Jeffrey ‘Scholar’
Nashanda Charles ‘Shanda’
Sean Niles ‘Sour Serpent’
Kelly Clyne ‘Rootsman Kelly’
Valene Nedd ‘Valene’
Randolph Isaac ‘Randy Isaac’
Jason Joseph ‘Big J’
Micah Joseph ‘Baraka’
Jerry Baptiste ‘Papa Jerry’
Jermaine Simon ‘Super Star’