Caribbean Beat (the in-flight magazine of Caribbean Airlines), debuts its new, more compact size this month - but will deliver the same high-quality content that made its name.

The cover illustration by Shalini Seereeram depicts a scene from the festival of lights, Divali.

Inside, Lisa Allen-Agostini is enchanted by a full-length recital of kathak dance, choreographed by Trinidadian master of classical Indian dance, Sat Balkaransingh.

She talks to him and other practitioners of this ancient art form.

Melanie Archer travels to Jamaica to work on an eco-friendly house, known as an earthship. Built from used tyres, recycled bottles and cans, earth and chicken wire, the earthship is completely self-sufficient. It makes its own electricity, harvests its own water and can contain and treat its own sewage on site. Is this a direction the rest of the region should follow?

Pan-historian Kim Johnson turns the spotlight on the little-known Nearlin Taitt, a musician who's famous for not being famous enough. Taitt, a Trinidadian, started his musical career as a panman, invented rocksteady and became a seminal influence on the Jamaican music scene.

well-kept secret

St Lucia's celebration of its Creole culture is a well-kept secret, but Laura Dowrich-Phillips travelled there to seek them out.

Music writer Wayne Bowman went to New York to hear the story of Rawlston Charles, the man who made Calypso Rose a star, and in whose honour the legendary band Charlie's Roots was named.

Ian Craig tells of the filmmaking course in Havana that's helping to forge stronger links between Cuba and the world.

Junot D'az, the Dominican-American writer whose latest novel is a massive hit with critics and readers alike, grants a rare interview to Jonathan Ali.

music video

James Ferguson draws parallels between the United States invasion of Grenada in 1983 and today's US-led war in Iraq. Nazma Muller profiles Ras Kassa, the region's hottest music-video director.

There are also pieces by Ray Funk, Garry Steckles, Tracy Assing, David Katz, and Guyanne Wilson. And that's not all: this issue also includes Caribbean Beat's regular features and columns, along with reviews of music and books from around the region.

Caribbean Beat is published six times a year for Caribbean Airlines by Media & Editorial Projects Limited.