The week of February 22 to March 1 is officially Dancehall Week, and the organisers say there will be a few changes as it relates to the focus, costumes and street parade.
For 2026, the focus is on highlighting the stakeholders and promoting the genre rather than creating new concepts. Also, following last year’s debacle, which saw the street parade cut short by the police owing to improper authorisation and clearance, high on the list is ensuring that all the lessons learnt are put in practice.
“Following the 2025 street parade permit issues, we believe that it’s important to increase communication, and maybe that was one of the challenges we had last year, even though we had to be moving the time based on last-minute decisions. We are still waiting on finalised confirmations of time for the street parade on March 1, so we won’t be able to necessarily give all that detail right now,”Janice Young, one of the organisers told THE WEEKEND STAR.
She added, “But we do plan to make changes based on what we’ve learnt over the last two years, so that [the parade] is definitely something that will still appeal to the masses, and at the same time, still follow some level of guidelines.”
Young explained that this year, creativity is the name of the game as it relates to the street parade which would normally mimic that of carnival revellers in identical themed costumes.
“What we want the street parade to be is really just an epitome of dancehall. So you won’t be purchasing costumes to come on the road … you’ll be creating. I think that part of Jamaican culture as well is our creativity. And so we leave persons the opportunity now to create their own concepts and looks for the street parade, instead of giving them options already developed.”
In a thrust to “push and focus on what already exists”, the weekly events scattered around the Corporate Area will be highlighted.
“We’re showing a valid presence at these weekly events and having persons recognise the importance of supporting the stakeholders that support dancehall. Persons actually fly into the island to celebrate dancehall [and] these are the places that they’re going. This is where they’re immersing themselves in the actual dancehall spirit and so Dancehall Week is promoting these nightly events,” Young stated.
She shared that the feedback has been “absolutely awesome” and pointed out that “it speaks volumes” that for the third straight year, Dancehall Week has been included in the annual Reggae Month calendar in February.
“The fact that we still have our title sponsor Magnum, who consistently wants to be a part of this execution and initiative, also speaks volumes with our partners, and it speaks volumes where we see persons in their hundreds coming out to support us on the road as well. So we anticipate the same level of success, and even more so for 2026.”
