CARLTON FRANCIS
DANCE WAS
CARLTON’S RELIGION
By Dr. Hollis
Liverpool
October 22, 2000
Page 76
All art loses its justification when divorced from religion. This is a line in a book written by Carlton Francis entitled Dance is my Religion published in 1982. I have chosen that line because those worlds to me capture the life and thinking of Carlton Francis, in that not only did he worship his God through art-dance to be specific but art for him demonstrated the link between man and his maker. God is the supreme artist, and we are links in the chain expressing his art in music, song, dance, paint and literature.
This was Carlton’s belief; this was his philosophy.
Carlton Francis was born in St James, Trinidad on November 1, 1940, and grew up in a post World War II environment that grappled with unemployment, dilapidated housing, and youths searching for the sound of pan to embellish their Carnival productions. His involvement in Carnival via pan turning, pan playing and costume design motivated him in his youth to take up dance and choreography, first as a hobby, then as a profession.
Educated at Mucurapo Boys’ RC School up to age 14 in 1955, he sought to further his education at the Royal Victoria Institute’s night classes from 1956 to 1958, for indeed he knew then, that to rise out of his environment of Carnival music makers upon whom middle and upper class Trinidadians frowned, one had to be as educated as they who made the laws. Thus he strove for a secondary education at Hudson Progressive Institute from 1958 to 1961, while at the same time educating himself in dance and the African heritage of music, religion and song from the elders in St James and its environs.
His efforts to achieve a good education were crowned when in 1973, he was given a one-year scholarship by the Government to study dance at the Martha Graham School of Contemporary Dance in New York where he gained a Diploma in Folk Dance and Choreography.
Without the GCE certificates to join the Public Service, and being a member of the Carnival tribe regarded then by society as outcasts, Carlton at age 17 became a pan tuner, tuning pans for a living up to 1964, when fortune smiled on him and he obtained a job at the Port of Spain City Council as a Health Control Officer. His skills in dance and dance productions, particularly at the Prime Minister’s Best Village Festivals, caught the eyes of the Government of the day, and, as such, he was given the job of Cultural Officer 1, from 1986. He served in that position until his retirement from the Public Service in 1999.
As a Cultural Officer, Carlton was not simply a liaison between the Government and the cultural organizations of the country, but he sought to pass on his learning to several groups and individuals by teaching them the basics of dance, correcting their mistakes and judging them in competitions sponsored by the Port of Spain City Council, the Ministry of Culture and Gender Affairs and the National Carnival Commission.
Furthermore, he held voluntary dance sessions at many public and private schools throughout Trinidad and Tobago, for he knew and believed that the children of the nation are our greatest resource.
In addition to teaching dance to the nation, Carlton set out to put his thoughts on paper for, as he himself said: I was startled by the woeful lack of documentation on the people who made the mas: the pan players, costume designers, wire-benders, masqueraders and their leaders.
As such, he left many written works that at present are invaluable in terms of their historical content and knowledge of the past. Documents such as The Saga of the Mid-West and African Folk Characters inform readers of the early days of pan in St James, and of the role of African spirits in every day life. Other papers by Carlton include Calypso in Carnival, A Tribute to Orisa Shango, and Dance - a Guide for Dance Instructors. Nor was he only interested in African culture, although it filled his entire being, for he left us a paper entitled The East Indian’s Contribution to the Caribbean.
More than a simple teacher of dance and a cultural officer, Carlton was truly an ambassador of this country. After forming the Carlton Francis Dance Company from the ashes of the Cocorite Youth Movement in 1962, Carlton and his Company performed far and wide ever since.
The Carifesta Festival in Grenada in 1965, the St Catherine Twinning Association gathering in Canada, the San Sebastien Festival in Venezuela, and festivals and shows in Suriname, Martinique, the US, and St Croix, to name a few, have all been touched by his choreography and his mastery.
Yet, while touring the world and showing off the dance skills of Trinidadians, he wrote and directed for locals over 22 full length productions for the theater, 49 cabaret-style works, over 25 scripts for television, and still found time to serve on several cultural boards and committees, including the National Festival Committee.
From his outstanding work, thousands have gained. Today many of our professional dancers and dance troupes owe their existence and professionalism to Carlton Francis. His teachings have benefited positively the Malick Folk Performing Company, the North West Laventille Group, Cocorite dancers, Ujaama drummers, and individuals such as Gene Toney, Jennifer Edwards, once a limbo queen, and Louis McWilliam, choreographer and dancer. As a choreographer, he has made many calypso lovers understand better some of the works of the Mighty Sparrow and others, especially those calypsos that hinge upon the African past. One simply had to sing and Carlton would do the rest, choreographing the dance in such a way that rather than take away the spotlight from the singer, his dance movements embellished both singer and song.
For his outstanding work over the years, he was rewarded in 1981 with a Certificate in Ritual and Cultural Arts from the University of the West Indies, St Augustine; Citations of Honour from the Port of Spain City Council in 1983 and 1985; a Citation of Honour from the St James Working Committee in 1990; a Certificate for Long and Outstanding Service by the National Dance Association of Trinidad and Tobago in 1994; an Award for his contribution to the Folk Dance traditions of the Caribbean by the Malick Folk Performing Company in 1997; and a plaque and bust of General Buddhoe, once an African leader in St Croix, by the St Croix Emancipation Committee. Buddhoe was a leader of the enslaved in St Croix; he fought for the liberation of his people from the Danes, and the mere fact that the St Croix Emancipation Committee could have rewarded Carlton with a bust of Buddhoe testifies to the high esteem in which he was held among the US Virgin islanders. The St Croix Emancipation Committee regarded Buddhoe and Carlton Francis as two great freedom fighters, for Carlton, by exploring folk dance, was reliving in a tangible way the beliefs and aspirations of the enslaved, the fight against oppression and Europeanism, and the demands to remove the discrimination and prejudice that Africans have had to face ever since their sojourn from Africa to the Caribbean. The St Croix Committee observed that Carlton by his dancing truly understood the evils of African enslavement.
In terms of his philosophy, dance for Carlton was primarily devotional; it was a prayer. It was the chief method of portraying and giving vent to his emotions; it was the dramatic instinct and religious fervour of his race. Thus he was proud to be a member of the Orisa faith, for Orisas place the same value of dance [as] a means of establishing contact with the ancestors and with God.
Carlton’s many children would tell you that home with Carlton was dance, dance and more dance. As children they could not understand, but as they grew older, they realised that this man ate, slept and dreamt of dance; no wonder his book for dance instructors is entitled Dance is my Religion.
We therefore today thank God and the ancestors for Carlton’s life and for his contribution to our civilization. He represented a tribe of Africans, now slowly dwindling by death, who understood the greatness of African traditions, and who sought to teach the youth that education is not only about arithmetic and English, but is first and foremost a tour of the areas where their forefathers toiled; it is the experience of drowning oneself in the spiritual and mundane way of life of one’s parents and grandparents. Dance was his religion; dance was his education; dance helped him to understand better his race and his fellow human beings; dance esteemed him as it esteemed his enslaved foreparents.
Now that he is gone and we celebrate his commitment to dance, we can best serve Carlton’s ideals in two ways.
Before he died, he made the point that he hoped that his death would serve as a guide to youth. Thus it is my hope that National Dance Association of Trinidad and Tobago (NDATT) and other similar institutions will ensure that Carlton’s Guide to Dance Instructors and his documented works, be they on film or paper, will all reach the youth. Secondly, on the front page of his paper Saga of the Mid-West, he wrote of the many old panmen and masqueraders whom he fund living beneath the poverty line. This caused him to remark: What a sad reflection of the fact that culture is no breadwinner.
Down to his last days he was bitter over the fact that by immersing himself in culture, he could have barely gained a decent living standard, and, worse, he felt that those in authority never gave him the rewards he deserved. We therefore can thank Carlton for his contribution by ensuring that our cultural icons be given greater financial rewards and that they be recognised through our system of national rewards. The Ministry of Culture and Gender Affairs and the National Dance Association can start the ball rolling by immediately recommending this stalwart dancer, writer, choreographer, teacher and cultural ambassador be given a national award in 2001.
We thank God for Carlton’s life and realise that the messenger has gone but the message remains. May his life increase our blessings and bring us closer to God.