According to the Trinidad Express:
TSTT’s executive head of Mobile and Legal Services, Lisa Agard, made this announcement yesterday at a media conference at the Hyatt Regency hotel in Port of Spain at which Montano was present.
’We’ve received agreement from Beyonce’s team to have our very own Machel Montano perform at the show. We know that many Machel fans will relish this opportunity to see him in his only local performance for the Carnival season. Together Machel and Beyonce will deliver a riveting three hours of performance that will thrill and excite and leave everyone wanting more,’ Agard said.
Montano explained that in spite of rumours and speculation that he was staying out of Carnival because of the concert, he had made the decision to sit out the season within the past year. He said he has been working on new projects, including the filming of a movie to develop himself and broaden his scope as an entertainer.
Montano said the Beyonce performance is a new development that came into being while he was here making preparations to film scenes of the movie entitled Scandalous on the streets of Port of Spain on Carnival Monday and Tuesday.
He said TSTT invited him to perform at the show and he told them he would once they got permission from Beyonce’s people for him to open for her.
’I was not planning to be here. However one of my projects, which is a movie that I am doing entitled Scandalous, is going to be filmed, parts of it are going to be filmed on Monday and Tuesday. It’s a soca Bollywood movie starring Machel Montano as the lead actor and featuring the music of Machel Montano with a lot of Indian interaction and Indian sounds,’ Montano said.
’As for the opportunities presented to me by bmobile to open for Beyonce, I must say that I was very excited to consider it because I was not really planning to make any appearances until I was fully ready to come back on the music scene in Trinidad and Tobago. I thought about it for a while and I said, OK if they approve I would take the responsibility to represent Trinidad and Tobago,’ Montano said.
Pan will also be a part of the event as the National Panorama champion of 2010 in the Large Band category will perform the National Anthem to open the show, while the winning band in the Medium Band category will perform for patrons entering the Queen’s Park Savannah.
As for the financing of the ’I Am...Beyonce in Concert’, and how would taxpayers be affected should the event, costing millions to produce, run at a loss as raised in a BBC article, Agard said such an idea is foolish.
She said that all indications are that the event will at least break even as in the two weeks since tickets went on sale TT$4.7 million has been realised with at least 300 tickets being purchased by people overseas.
Source
If you want to attend, you can purchase tickets HERE.
