Allow me to invite you into the world of Soca, Reggae, and Tassa music. These are a few types of music found in the Caribbean. If you wanted to Soca to a beat, then Trinidadian music is in order. For scanting, lets pump up the volume with some Reggae music by Bob Marley. As for Tassa, it's definitely Indian drums at it's best, and you must be able to move rather fast and furious to this one. It's all good I promise.

I remember the very first time I heard a Bob Marley song. On our way home from school one day, my friend Rafeena was repeatedly singing a new song I had never heard. The lyrics were unique and political, and it soon caught my attention. As we walk down Camp Street, Georgetown toward our homes I listened attentively. Later I asked her about the song, she fished out a dirty piece of paper with the lyrics written down, and told me all about the music of Marley. So I hurriedly copied it, and we scurried over to my house and waited patiently by the radio for it to play. Soon we got our wish and before long, I was scanting to the beat and singing the words of "Rat Race," from my copy of lyrics. Okay so Rafeena taught me how to scant, but I did have the long hair to emulate the locks of a Rasta. My Mom thought I had gone completely nuts. Today when I scant with my kids, it is now my husband who thinks that I've gone nuts. My love for Reggae is ire, with a wide cast of musicians like UB40, Peter Tosh, Jimmy Cliff, Eddy Grant, Damian "Junior Gong" Marley, Ziggy Marley, and Shaggy downloaded in my Ipod. I know for sure that scanting on a thread mill in the gym is an acquired skill and completely good for the body and soul. Irie Mon!

Soca musicians are plentiful and their music is always spicy with lyrics that make you laugh out loud. It is a given at many functions and sometimes referred to as "Jump Up Music." You will always hear from the good old ones like Lord Shorty, Calypso Rose, Byron Lee and the Dragonaires, The Mighty Sparrow, and Arrow and many others. Today the promise of great Soca is kept by artists like Baha Men, El-A-Kru, Rikki Jai, Sugar Daddy, and Edwin Yearwood. Soca music is a Carnival must in Trinidad, the Bahamas, and other Islands. As a matter of fact, be careful not to say Soca three times, because it may possibly cause a Carnival in the dead of winter in New York.

Pair your music with some good Caribbean food. Click on the related link below.

** Scanting is how one dances to Reggae music.**