Famous Guyanese singer Shelly-G, second from right, stands with a member of the Orange Police Department, center, Guyana American Heritage Foundation President Lady Ira, right, and others on Saturday, Aug. 5, at the Orange annual Caribbean Heritage Festival and Parade in Monte Irvin Orange Park.
ORANGE, NJ — Orange hosted the annual Caribbean Heritage Festival and Parade on Saturday, Aug. 5, that ended with a concert in Monte Irvin Orange Park, where one of Guyana’s biggest stars, singer Shelly-G, stole the show.
After performing some of her most popular hits, she closed out her show with the fan favorite,“Touch Me,” and added a bit of audience participation to spice up the family-oriented event, inviting Irvington High School Class of 2012 alumnus Greg Cespedes to come on stage and demonstrate his “whining skills.”
Whining is a form of dancing that is a staple of Caribbean music from reggae to dancehall, and Shelly-G said she wanted to find out if any native-born Americans had the chops to stay true to their immigrant heritage. Cespedes is American with Costa Rican heritage, and Shelly-G really put him to the test.
“I’ve been coming to America for a couple of years now and the one thing that I’ve never experienced is a white man that can whine with me,” Shelly-G told the audience packed into the north end of Monte Irvin Park for her performance. “I want to know if there is anybody out there that can whine with me. Show me what you’re working with.”
Cespedes accepted Shelly-G’s challenge and she admitted he had the skills, saying the dancing was all in good fun and part of her standard stage show.
“I just killed the stage in Orange Park,” Shelly-G said after the show. “I loved it. It was good. It reminded me of home. A second home. Guyana will always be my first home.”
According to Lady Ira, president of the Guyana American Heritage Foundation who helped organize the Orange Caribbean Heritage Festival, Shelly-G will be back in New Jersey on Saturday, Aug. 26, at the Music and Jerk Festival at College Park in Orange.
“So come out and celebrate and meet all our new artists and have fun. This was a very great event. I think we had like 10,000 people in here. I’ve been here for many years and I’m sponsoring this event. I did the parade this morning at 12 noon, when we came in here. We represent New Jersey. We represent Orange, East Orange and Newark,” said Lady Ira on Saturday, Aug. 5. “If you know that East Orange has one of the largest concentrations of Guyanese, 2.9 percent of Guyanese people live in East Orange and Orange. It’s the largest percent of Guyanese in the United States. We’re one people, one nation, representing Guyana.”
For more information about the Orange Caribbean Heritage Festival and Parade, call Nikki Amos at 973-266-4111, ext. 5003, or Campanella Godfrey at 973-266-4053.
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Lovely
This is ridiculous who wrote this nonsense
This Shelly-g music is the worst thing you have ever heard she has zero talent so stop fooling this young girl into believing she going somewhere with this, she needs to go to School and get a job and get some sense.
Guyanese star, stop embarrassing our people with nonsense. We have real talent somewhere there
Everyone please stop lying to this young lady
She has zero talent and sounds rediclous
One of the wort thing I have ever heard for music. Girl go to school and get a education there is no easy way out you are wasting your life
Guyanese people are some wicked people the all sit back and get a good laugh knowing all too well that she Shelly -g can’t sing but wouldn’t tell the gal so the sit back and let she embarrass she self, girl that’s why nobody would buy ya music it’s not we don’t support we own but we don’t support joke