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Soca

Pronounced /SOH-kah/nounMusic

Meaning

The high-energy dance music of Carnival, created in the early 1970s by Lord Shorty, who blended calypso with Indian rhythms and instruments such as the dholak and dhantal. Today soca is the soundtrack of fetes, wining and mas.

Turn up the soca, we pregaming for the fete!

In plain English: Turn up the music, we're getting ready for the party!

Where it comes from

Lord Shorty described his new style as the 'soul of calypso'. A journalist's spelling of the name, 'soca', is the one that stuck.

Used in

Sources

  1. KAXE / NPR: Long live soca, celebrating 50 years of Trinidad's soundtrack to Carnival
  2. Caribbean Beat: Behind the soca music
  3. Traditional Mas Archive: Carnival terms

Last verified 3 October 2026. Spotted something wrong? Send a correction.