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Caribbean festival to spice up Vinoy Park

Music, food, accents and costumes will create an island experience.

By AMARIS CASTILLO
Published June 6, 2007

	Diana Shaw-Fitzgerald and granddaughter R'Naiah Mann shoot down an inflated slide at the Tampa Bay Caribbean Carnival last year. This weekend, a highlight will be the El Gran Combo, a renowned Puerto Rican salsa orchestra, performing at 8 p.m. Saturday.
[Times 2006 photo]

ST. PETERSBURG - The sounds of steel drums and salsa music will permeate downtown this weekend, when the 15th annual Tampa Bay Caribbean Carnival arrives at Vinoy Park.

The carnival will be two days of Caribbean-influenced music, dance, food and attire. The event is presented by the Trinidad and Tobago American Association of Central Florida, and sponsors include St. Petersburg, Bright House Networks, the Nielsen Co. and Budweiser.

On Saturday, the park will be open from noon to 10 p.m. There will be various steel drum bands performing, as well as soca, reggae and calypso music. El Gran Combo, one of Puerto Rico's most renowned salsa orchestras, will perform at 8 p.m.

A party will be held at 10 p.m. at the West Tampa Convention Center. It will feature music by several Caribbean artists. Admission is $25 in advance, $35 at the door.

The festival will include vendors selling authentic Caribbean food.

"You can come get a taste of the islands, " said George Carrington, president of the Trinidad and Tobago American Association of Central Florida.

There will be arts and crafts for patrons, as well as a children's area with rides and games.

Carrington described the carnival as an educational experience.

"Hear the music, hear the different Caribbean people's accents ... see the colorful costumes; it's like art, you know?" he said. "It's like being to the Caribbean without leaving the shores of America."

Gates open at 1 p.m. Sunday. There will be a costume parade, with "moco jumbies, " the Trinidadian term for stilt walkers.

Local artists will perform Sunday, followed by the headliner, Trinidadian soca artist Bunji Garlin.

"If you've never been associated with the Caribbean culture or Hispanic culture, you need to come out just to learn and to have fun, " said Wanda Hayes-Riddick, volunteer coordinator of the carnival.

"You will learn of the different foods, and the colors, and the flags, and see people be very patriotic about where they were born."

Proceeds from the carnival will go to the Trinidad and Tobago American Association of Central Florida. A portion will go to a Trinidad orphanage, Carrington said.

Deshaun Sylvester, one of the designers for the carnival's Web site, said the carnival is pure energy, "a day of enjoyment where you can sit back, relax and have a piece of the Caribbean culture come to you. You put all your differences aside and just go to enjoy yourself."

"I have never gone to the islands. I've always wanted to go to the islands, " festival coordinator Hayes-Riddick said. "For this weekend, the Vinoy Park has turned into one of the islands."

If you go

Tampa Bay Caribbean Carnival

Saturday: Steel bands, local entertainment and El Gran Combo

Sunday: Costume parade, local entertainment and a performance by Bunji Garlin

Admission: $10 for a single day, $15 for a two-day ticket, free for children under 12.

Information: Call 327-1277 or visit tampacarnival.com.

[Last modified June 5, 2007, 22:32:48]