The Introduction of UK Carnivals

7 days ago, the world witnessed what some would term, the ‘greatest show on earth’. Whilst critics and sceptics alike might have argued that it was the barmiest, boring, politically and confused 2012 Olympic opening ceremony ever to be held, I, a Danny Boyle fan beg to differ.

It was the inclusion of a band whose history is steeped, deep within the birth of Notting Hill Carnival, Nostalgia Steelband, and the remembrance of the first generation of Caribbean immigrants who arrived here in 1948, that did it. Watched by around a billion viewers across the world, in a spate of defined genius creativity, Danny Boyle succeeded in portraying to the world an important and vital piece in British history, the painful and emotionally scar-ridden legacy that birthed the ‘second greatest show’ on earth, Notting Hill Carnival.

The carnivals of Great Britain span the width of England and are as confused, diverse and multicultural as their former ruler. During this month of August we celebrate the Emancipation of Slavery given on the 1^st of August 1838, the double 50^th Anniversary of Trinidad & Tobago and Jamaica, the 48^th Notting Hill Carnival and 53 years later on, remember Claudia Jones (RIP), the first ever Trinidadian, to organise a carnival and see her dream lived out through the birth of NHC. Also in our quest and pursuit to showcase our diversely, rich, exotic ridden culture, we learn and understand the history that developed carnival and remember and value immensely, what Carnival was borne out of…FREEDOM!

In one of those ‘rare, never to be scene or captured’ moments, UKSS had the pleasure of quizzing  being outspoken by none other, than the UK based, revered, pioneer of the UK soca scene, Soca Prince Martin Jay and the “first class” globetrotting soca DJ, Barrie Hype.

Check out the exclusive, video prequel to our written series on the British Empire and its Carnivals.