Sound on the move
At the Toronto Caribbean Carnival, building moving sound systems is all about precision and pride
Words, photography, and video by Sarah Espedido
THE GLOBE AND MAIL
Published August 29, 2025
SCARBOROUGH, ONTARIO
Tribal Carnival
Avinash Jaikarran leads construction of the truss system for Tribal Carnival’s truck in preparation for the Grand Parade.
3 days before the Grand Parade
In an east Toronto truck yard, Harish Pitamber, 27, reviews the sound system schematics he drafted as the lead audio engineer for Tribal Carnival.
“There are 101 ways the power can be cut off,” Pitamber said. “There’s a lot of room for error in the hot sun, playing with a bunch of electronics that are susceptible to heat, with no room on board for a backup generator.”
Fuelled by pizza, Red Bull and hot wings, the sound crew arrives straight from their day jobs ready to work into the early hours. As midnight rolls around, another batch of speakers arrives. Nine crew members hoist, stack, and strap down the 160-pound speakers onto the truck.
Using a measuring tape, Pitamber carefully angles the speakers. Proper placement is crucial. Otherwise, “dead zones” can form as sound waves interfere and cancel each other out.
MISSISSAUGA, ONTARIO
Freedom Mas
The Freedom Mas sound crew works into the early morning hours of the
Toronto Caribbean Festival’s Grand Parade
1 day before the Grand Parade
On a Friday afternoon, the sun blazes down on a Mississauga truck yard. With less than 24 hours before Toronto’s annual Carnival parade, Freedom Mas hasn’t started building its sound system. The semi-truck bed for the float is four hours late, and the rented speakers aren’t what were ordered.
Khalil Bernard is pacing anxiously across the yard. As lead DJ for Freedom Mas, the only masquerade band (mas band) playing primarily Jamaican music in the Grand Parade, Bernard carries the weight of ensuring their sound system delivers not just tunes, but a statement of cultural pride.
“Will they know that we were pulling out hair and crying behind the scenes and all of this before the parade started?” he asked.
Jamaicans are the inventors of the sound clash, a competition that originated in the dancehall scene in the late 1950s. DJs, MCs and engineers build and operate mobile speaker setups. These setups were traditionally built from salvaged parts and prioritized function over form. Crews battle for dominance, trying to outplay one another with louder and more exclusive tracks. That legacy permeates amid the chaos and improvisation Bernard now finds himself navigating.
“I like to show the new technology we have going on in audio, simple but powerful,” Bernard said. “I call it cute versus the old sound that’s big and scary.”
Crew member Horace Gunter wasn’t having it. He chimed in, speaking in Jamaican Patois: “Don’t yuh ever call nah bass bin cute!”
“Yuh waan see dem? Dem pretty man!” Bernard exclaimed. “The amount of power makes them pretty.”
Gunter grinned, “Dat makes dem sexy.”
1:00 a.m. The morning of the Grand Parade
DJ Odjay (Orin Favourite) shouts “365 Magnum Riddim!” as he slams a button on his audio mixer, firing up the speakers with his exclusive DJ mix. Bernard and fellow DJ Jay Wright jump in without missing a beat, singing and dancing alongside him. The first sound check is a success.
Before the main parade down Lake Shore Boulevard, the sound systems are unveiled at the main stage outside the Budweiser stadium.
Bass rumbles through the air as Tribal Carnival’s DJs take the helm, sending thrumming vibrations that ripple through the crowd. “Nothing other than bass makes people want to move,” said Pitamber. “Caribana is the only time we get to bring a bit of that heavy sound system culture to Toronto without as much red tape. We have permission to be ourselves for one day.”
Pitamber scans the crowd around Tribal Carnival, a band of 950 masqueraders, assessing how many people are dancing to the music pumping out of the truck. This is the true barometer of success – how deep into the crowd the sound penetrates.
“If people are jumping around, the DJ is hype, it’s literally a smile on your face and then you start dancing too.”
Khalil Bernard stands atop the speaker system he designed aboard Freedom Mas band’s truck.e.”
As a child at the parade, Bernard was once only an observer, too, waiting for the rare truck that played dancehall or reggae when the traditional sound of soca tended to dominate.
“That was the best 20 minutes of the day, of the year,” he said. “I couldn’t wait until I could go up and get my chance to be there.”