TEKEL SYLVAN head is literally in the clouds these days, having been declared the first King Moko Dance Champion 2024 on August 30, followed by an opportunity immediately afterwards to perform at the Apollo Theater, New York, in celebration of Trinidad and Tobago’s 62nd anniversary of Independence.
Winning the local competition with his own costume design and make-up as a skeleton, while demonstrating mad skills by removing one side of the five-foot stilts, while in motion, and dancing with only one stilt, was an amazing feat for him and validates his belief “that I am the best.”
That daring act of being about 13-14 feet in the air, precariously balancing, put him ahead of his competitors.
[caption id="attachment_1108271" align="alignnone" width="768"] Tekel Sylvan shows details of his makeup which he did himself to accompany the skeleton costume which he designed. - Photo by Yvonne Webb[/caption]
He said before the competition, “I would be bringing the trophy home” – and knew he had to do something extraordinary to achieve this.
He has performed at Machel Mondays in the past, and alongside other artistes, but being one of two TT moko jumbies on stage at the iconic Apollo with top artistes at the calypso night, was beyond his wildest dreams.
“It was an amazing feeling to be part of that production. I have performed with calypsonians and soca artistes before, but seeing all of them on one stage, communicating backstage, the vast audience – that was mind-blowing.”
The experience was even more astonishing, he said, as he was told he was one of the first of two moko jumbies to perform at the Apollo.
Sylvan and Earl Ward were the two invited by the NCC to participate in three nights of calypso music, when infectious Caribbean rhythms were on full display.
[caption id="attachment_1108273" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Tekel Sylvan, winner of the first U Juice SLYM Festival, centre, with second placed, Antonio Perelion, left, and Jahmarley Bisnath. - Photo by Yvonne Webb[/caption]
He said on September 3, he performed at the Apollo with Machel Montano, Crazy, Olatunji, Kurt Allen, Lord Nelson and others. On September 6, he travelled to Canada to showcase his skills at the Toronto carnival.
“This is not my first carnival, though. I have been to Grenada and Miami carnivals and Brooklyn Labor Day.”
The San Fernando father of two said stilt-walking saved his life.
Growing up in what he termed “the ghetto,” in a single-mother household, his father was imprisoned when he was just three. He said his life could have gone downhill as he did not have the acumen for academics.
While he enjoyed sports, he was not passionate about them either. So when at age eight he discovered the Junior Bisnath Kaisokah School for the Arts, he latched on to that like a drowning man and honed his skills, encouraged by Bisnath, who embraced him as a son.
He recalled he often got into trouble with his mother, because he would leave chores undone to go stilt-walking, something he later corrected.
“Today, she is my bigg
