Emotional tribute concert honours late Moricia Cagan

IN­NIS FRAN­CIS

A star-stud­ded cast, in­clud­ing three for­mer Ca­lyp­so Mon­archs, turned out in sup­port of a trib­ute con­cert held in ho­n­our of the Mori­cia Ca­gan Foun­da­tion, cel­e­brat­ing the life and lega­cy of the late cul­tur­al fig­ure.

Ca­gan, who was wide­ly recog­nised for her con­tri­bu­tions to Trinidad and To­ba­go’s en­ter­tain­ment land­scape, was par­tic­u­lar­ly not­ed for her work with the now-de­funct state-spon­sored mu­si­cal en­sem­ble Di­vine Echoes Or­ches­tra, ini­tial­ly formed un­der for­mer prime min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning in 2007. She passed away on March 24 last year af­ter a long ill­ness at the age of 48. She is sur­vived by her iden­ti­cal twin sis­ter, Mar­sha Ca­gan.

Through­out her ca­reer, Ca­gan dis­tin­guished her­self as a mul­ti-dis­ci­pli­nary cre­ative—an ath­lete, mu­sic per­former, beau­ty queen, self-taught pan­nist and vi­su­al artist—who col­lab­o­rat­ed wide­ly across Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cul­tur­al com­mu­ni­ty.

That breadth of artistry was re­flect­ed in the evening’s pro­gramme.

The trib­ute con­cert, held at Na­pari­ma Bowl on the an­niver­sary of her pass­ing, opened with a mov­ing per­for­mance by her hus­band, Nigel O’Con­nor, who had shared the stage with her for many years.

His set in­clud­ed Bridge Over Trou­bled Wa­ter, fol­lowed by ren­di­tions of I Be­lieve in Love, Nev­er Too Much, and Free­town Col­lec­tive’s Take Me Home and Kaya.

A par­tic­u­lar­ly emo­tion­al mo­ment came when her cousin and mu­sic teacher, Kevin Bellille, de­liv­ered a melod­ic in­ter­pre­ta­tion of Nev­er Enough, a per­for­mance many de­scribed as a fit­ting re­flec­tion of her life and spir­it.

En­ter­tain­ment con­tin­ued with per­for­mances by Kedi­jah Je­re­mi­ah, backed by mem­bers of the Di­vine Echoes Or­ches­tra, de­liv­er­ing a string of crowd favourites in­clud­ing Some­one Loves You Hon­ey, I Wan­na Dance With Some­body, and Ca­gan’s per­son­al favourite, Nat­ur­al Woman by Aretha Franklin.

The au­di­ence re­spond­ed warm­ly to a dy­nam­ic fa­ther-and-son set by Du­ane and Taza­yah O’Con­nor, who per­formed No Front Page, Wait Dorothy Wait, Cast Them Away, and I Am I Said, draw­ing pa­trons to their feet and in­to rhythm.

One of the evening’s most poignant mo­ments came when Mar­sha Ca­gan took the stage. Her strik­ing re­sem­blance to Mori­cia drew a vis­i­ble emo­tion­al re­ac­tion from the au­di­ence as she per­formed My Help. Paus­ing briefly, she ded­i­cat­ed the per­for­mance with the words, “This one is for you, sis­ter.”

Ca­gan’s life and in­flu­ence were al­so ho­n­oured through dance, as mem­bers of the Shiv Shan­ti Dance Com­pa­ny—long­time col­lab­o­ra­tors dur­ing her artis­tic jour­ney—de­liv­ered a chore­o­graphed trib­ute while hold­ing a por­trait of her.

The pro­gramme main­tained its mo­men­tum with per­for­mances from Lin­don David and the Drums of David, Vic­to­ria “Queen Vic­to­ria” Coop­er-Rahim, and a slate of artistes in­clud­ing Mar­sha “La­dy Adan­na” Clifton, Ter­rance Shore, Vaugh­nette Big­ford, James Fen­ton, Mar­va New­ton, and Rod­er­ick “Chuck Gor­don” Gor­don, whose 2026 ca­lyp­so To­ry Time sparked con­ver­sa­tion among pa­trons.

Lat­er in the evening, Mar­sha an­nounced plans for the es­tab­lish­ment of a cul­tur­al foun­da­tion in her sis­ter’s name, aimed at sup­port­ing young artistes and pre­serv­ing Mori­cia’s lega­cy in the arts.

“With this con­cert, I have a plan to start a foun­da­tion in the name of my sis­ter, Mori­cia Ca­gan—a cul­tur­al foun­da­tion,” she said. “We are in the process, and be­cause I am com­mit­ted to it, I al­so want to sup­port two re­cip­i­ents who were close to what Mori­cia be­lieved in.”

She pre­sent­ed to­kens of sup­port to UTT art stu­dent Jaiden Bain and the Sandy’s Mu­sic Acad­e­my in Cou­va, both of whom she said rep­re­sent­ed the next gen­er­a­tion of cre­ative tal­ent Mori­cia cham­pi­oned.

In a fur­ther sym­bol­ic ges­ture, Mar­sha gift­ed Mori­cia’s steel­pan and gui­tar to emerg­ing in­stru­men­tal­ists, en­sur­ing that her artis­tic lega­cy con­tin­ues through new voic­es in Trinidad and To­ba­go’s cul­tur­al land­scape.