Soca grew out of calypso — the traditional music of the Caribbean, known for its witty, storytelling lyrics and upbeat rhythms. In the 1970s, musicians began mixing calypso with faster beats and more electronic sounds to create soca. The result was music designed for dancing, with a strong, pounding bass beat that you feel in your chest as much as hear with your ears.
Soca has many sub-styles. Power soca has big, thumping beats. Groovy soca is slightly slower and more melodic. Chutney soca mixes Caribbean rhythms with music from South Asian traditions. In Saint Lucia, soca is especially central to carnival season, when the streets fill with dancers in spectacular costumes moving to the pounding music from huge speakers on trucks.
Learning to dance to soca is all about responding to the beat — moving your hips, waving your arms and bouncing with the rhythm. There are often competitions at carnival for the best soca track of the year, and winning that competition is a huge honour for a Caribbean musician. The winning song becomes the anthem of the whole carnival season.