THE BEST ACTS from this year's Crop-Over festival are heading for the Big Apple for Labour Day.
This is an initiative from two Bajan-Yankee promoters who think that Barbados and Barbadian artistes are poorly represented at New York's Labour Day celebrations. Save the efforts of the Barbados Tourism Authority (BTA), Andy Fax Vaughn from Bayville Entertainment claimed that except for the Barbados truck on the road during the massive West Indian carnival, very little is done to showcase Bajan talent.
Vaughn and his business partner Anthony Harris are addressing this absence with the staging of a star-studded concert in Brooklyn over the Labour Day weekend.
The show dubbed Cohobblopot, The Best Of Barbados will feature acts such as reigning Calypso Monarch Red Plastic Bag, Tune-o-de-Crop winner and People's Monarch Edwin Yearwood, krosfyah, Peter Ram and others.
Fax, a former nightclub owner in Brooklyn, recently told the DAILY NATION while on a talent scouting trip to the island, that the concert was set against the backdrop of under-representation by Bajan artistes at the Labour Day festivities.
"Over the past few years Barbados has been poorly represented during Labour Day celebrations. Years ago artistes would come up from the Caribbean and basically perform under one umbrella," Vaughn explained.
During his years as a nightclub operator he observed that there were mainly Trinidadian promoters producing events around Labour Day, and to a great extent local acts were marginalised on the card.
"There was never really a Barbadian package before. There would be cases where one or two Bajan artistes would perform on shows put on by Trinis, but they would never really carry a full show," he said.
"Apart from the Barbados truck on the road there was nothing to show what had happened during the Crop-Over Festival in the fetes leading up to the parade. And even then, there are only so many artistes that can perform on the truck for one day," he said.
He explained the idea also behind the concert was to showcase to Bajan-Yankees who were unable to come 'home' during Crop-Over, the popular artistes from fêtes over the six-week festival back home.
"On one stage for one night we're trying to get all the music they missed and say to them, look this is what happened back home," he said.
In light of the massive response garnered by single acts such as Peter Ram, Hypasounds and Li'l Rick throughout the year, Fax is confident the response to the Brooklyn version of Cohobblopot will be just as massive.
"And they perform to tracks sometimes but the response is overwhelming. There is definitely a market for a show such as this one particularly as it would be hot after Crop-Over," he said.
Efforts to contact officials of the BTA and the Ministry of Tourism "on plans for Labour Day weekend were unsuccessful up to press time.