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TriSzy: the Brooklyn and Dominica rapper who ended up singing bouyon

Published October 20, 2026

TriSzy is the artist name of Tristan Shillingford, a singer and rapper born in Brooklyn, schooled in Dominica, then back in the United States, where he started in music as a hip hop rapper with the collective The Mixed Breed. For five years his catalog, released on the ThaMixedBreedz banner, stays on the rap side and in what he himself calls Island Pop. Then, in April 2025, he releases “Bouyon Mood”, a bouyon single produced by Fr3EzE and mixed by Tha WizZarD, and the record becomes the centre of his story: the Caribbean press picks it up, and Shazam ranks it among his most streamed songs. This profile follows the catalog year by year, from “Farenheit” in 2020 to “Eat Dat Up” in 2026, reads “Bouyon Mood” in the text, and separates what the platforms document from what only the press reports.

Who TriSzy is: Brooklyn, Dominica, The Mixed Breed

The full name is given by the press coverage of May 2025 and confirmed by the platform credits: Tristan Shillingford, known as TriSzy. The Shazam pages of “Bend & Bounce” and “Gade Sa” credit Tristan Shillingford as songwriter, and the page of “Eat Dat Up” credits him on vocals, alongside Corel Domnique. The identity behind the stage name is therefore no mystery: this is one of the rare files of this wave where the legal name, the artist name and the writing credits line up cleanly on opened sources.

The path, as the press tells it in his own words, starts in Brooklyn, where he was born. He returned to Dominica as a child, attending Convent Preparatory School and then the Dominica Grammar School. Back in the United States afterwards, he began his music career as a rapper with the collective The Mixed Breed, shortened to TMB. The banner of his releases, ThaMixedBreedz, keeps the trace of that collective in the label name itself, and his Shazam artist page still files him, in 2026, under hip hop and rap: the original label was never erased, even after the bouyon turn.

His stated style carries a name: Island Pop. In the interviews carried by CaribMagPlus, Variety News Group and The Bajan Reporter, he describes a blend built over the years, hip hop, R&B, dancehall and soca, melted into an island formula. That is not a platform tag, it is his artist self portrait, and this profile reports it as such. What is verifiable, by contrast, is the matter of the catalog: singles in English and Dominican Creole, rotating features, and production handed to a small circle of Dominican names, Kirky at the start, then Tha WizZarD, Egg and SAVION.

The thread holding the whole path together is the link to Dominica. Schooled on the island, he collaborates early with artists of the Dominican scene, Colton T on “Inside Me” and Shelly on “Bum Pain”, two records reported by the press, for which no platform page was found during this research, and which therefore stay out of the verified track list of this page. And when he speaks about his island in interviews, it is to defend one precise idea: that Dominica can export something other than bouyon. That idea will produce a record in 2020, then, five years later, its apparent opposite: his biggest bouyon record.

The catalog before bouyon: the ThaMixedBreedz years, 2020 to 2022

The Shazam artist page gives the catalog a dated spine, and it starts in 2020. Two releases carry that year: “Farenheit”, an album credited to TriSzy with Jayy Lav featuring, and “Take Off”, a single shared with Kruziano. In December 2020 comes “If Is One Thing”, the single whose story the next section tells, because it holds, in seed form, the whole debate that “Bouyon Mood” will reopen in 2025. No source presents any of those records as bouyon: these are the rap and Island Pop years, and Shazam files them in the same catalog, with no break.

The year 2021 lines up three collective singles. “Mixbreed”, gathering TriSzy, Solow Rose, Ti Bandz and Dizzle Raw, carries the name of the original collective, The Mixed Breed, like a manifesto. “Pretty N Clean” invites Munga Honorable, a name of Jamaican dancehall, and the full page title specifies the pair Triszy and Jayylav. “Glow” invites Young Spray. The model is already the model of the later years: a core, guests, singles, no album after “Farenheit”, and a distribution built record by record.

In 2022, two singles close this first period. “Best Believe”, whose Shazam page was opened for this profile, was released on February 11, 2022 on ThaMixedBreedz, in English, at 97 BPM, with TriSzy performing and writing and Kirky producing. That is the tempo of a rap record, very far from the 160 BPM of the 2025 bouyon singles, and that tempo contrast, read in the pages themselves, measures the distance travelled between the two periods. The same year, “I’m Not Sowi”, featuring Tehilah, still figures in 2026 among the most streamed songs of his artist page: the first period is not a disowned draft, it still carries part of his listening.

Between 2022 and 2025, the artist page lists no new release under his name. That catalog silence, close to three years, is a platform fact, and this profile gives it without filling it: no source consulted explains the pause, and no release of that period was found. When the name returns, in January 2025, it is with “Di Code”, a heavy record, then, three months later, with the single that changes his scale. The pause is therefore part of the documented story: TriSzy does not slide slowly toward bouyon, he comes back to the platforms after a gap, and he enters bouyon head on.

“If Is One Thing”: a promoter line, and the answer in song

To understand “Bouyon Mood”, you have to pass through “If Is One Thing”, published on December 7, 2020 according to the single page on Shazam. The press tells the genesis of the record in the artist words: in 2021, he returned to Dominica to film the video for this single, which answers directly a line then circulating from a bouyon promoter, that the only thing that can make it out of Dominica is bouyon. At the time, he says, he wanted to prove that other genres, hip hop among them, could also represent Dominica, and he took the line on in song.

The detail that makes the story solid is that the lyrics of “Bouyon Mood”, opened in full on the Shazam page of the record, quote the same line five years later, this time naming its author in the text: Tridel is said to have stated that bouyon alone will make it out of Dominica. The verse adds the reaction of the time, the upset, then the fall: if you cannot beat them, join them. The press of 2025 and the lyrics of 2025 therefore tell the same scene from two different ends, and that cross check is the strongest piece of the TriSzy file.

That turnaround should be read for what it is, and the artist himself phrases it plainly in the 2025 interviews: he did not take on bouyon to prove a point, but to test himself creatively, to see whether he could sing on a bouyon track. The nuance matters for this site, which documents a scene where bouyon soca, started by Dada in 2003 in Dominica per the first hand testimony of Sean “Smokiller” Francis, then popularized by Triple Kay, has become the common language of the island: entering bouyon, for a Dominican rapper of the diaspora, is not changing country, it is stepping into the central conversation of his island. Our bouyon soca page gives that context in full.

One question remains, the title of the 2025 single, which the sources write two ways. The general press, CaribMagPlus in front, calls it “Mood”. The music press, 13th Street Promotions, and above all the Shazam platform page, call it “Bouyon Mood”. This profile keeps the platform form, “Bouyon Mood”, because it is the form of the official catalog, and flags the short form as the form of the articles. The release is dated to April 2025 by the press, and the Shazam page of the record is published on April 18, 2025: the two datings meet.

2025, the bouyon year: “Di Code”, “Bouyon Mood”, “Bend & Bounce”, “Gade Sa”

The year 2025 holds four singles under his name on the artist page, and they do not all resemble each other. “Di Code”, published on January 17, 2025, opens the year on a grave register: the lyrics, opened on Shazam, tell of a woman cornered by bills, a former partner who hurt her, a lost job, and the injunction not to go against the code. It is not a party record, and its presence among the most streamed songs of the artist page says that the TriSzy audience does not come only to dance. No source presents “Di Code” as a bouyon record, and this profile does not either.

“Bouyon Mood”, in April, is the documented bouyon record of the year, and its making is a precise press fact: produced by Fr3EzE, a Dominican producer the press links to records by Shelly and Signal Band as well as Trilla G, and mixed and mastered by Tha WizZarD. The press of May 2025 counts more than 6,000 YouTube views in the first weeks, with dance videos from listeners in Dominica and beyond. On Shazam, the record stands among the most streamed of the artist, alongside “Gade Sa” and “Bend & Bounce”. The scale remains that of an emerging artist, the artist page totals 672 identifications at the time of research, but the mechanism is complete: one record, a producer of the current wave, a press that follows, and a listening that lasts.

The rest of the year confirms the tempo. “Bend & Bounce” was released on August 1, 2025 on ThaMixedBreedz, in English, at 160 BPM, the exact tempo of the party records of this scene, with Tristan Shillingford writing and Egg, credited as Egg (Keron Hunter), producing. “Gade Sa” follows on October 3, 2025, still on ThaMixedBreedz, still at 160 BPM, with Tha WizZarD producing this time. Both pages show 7 Shazam identifications each at the time of opening: these are catalog records, not measured hits, and this profile presents them as such. Their documentary value lies elsewhere: they prove that “Bouyon Mood” was not a one off, but the opening of a run at the same tempo and under the same banner.

Around the singles, the artist page also shows a TriSzy guesting on other people records: “Highway”, by Thiotee, “Keep Going”, by Young Swagg, where he shares the feature with Nawizi and DiYoute, “H.O.V”, by Black Diamond and Kirky Beats, and “Cool Vibe”, shared with G-Rated. Those appearances, listed by Shazam among his most streamed songs, draw the real network of the man: less a star of the bouyon wave than a connector of the small Dominican scene and its diaspora, present in other catalogs as much as in his own. That is also why his entry into bouyon matters: it comes through a man of the network, not through an outsider.

“Bouyon Mood” read closely: a manifesto in Creole and English

The lyrics of “Bouyon Mood”, published on the Shazam page of the record, deserve a slow reading, because they turn the single into a small manifesto of the bouyon of 2025. The chorus states the thesis in mixed Dominican Creole and English: the bouyon and the riddim put the listener in the mood, he wants to jump and scream. Then comes the line this site keeps as the sharpest of the record: he likes soca, but it is this bouyon that puts him in the mood. In one line, the record replays, at the scale of a personal taste, the debate our bouyon soca page documents at the scale of the genre history.

The second movement of the lyrics is geographic. The text runs through the islands, Saint Lucia, Antigua, Trinidad, then the whole Caribbean, Guadeloupe, the Virgin Islands, and repeats the same explanation for each: they like it, because it is a mood. Bouyon is presented there as already released, already outside, and the record places itself inside that movement rather than launching it. For an artist born in Brooklyn and based in the United States, that map is not decoration: it describes exactly the space where his record circulates, the island, the neighbours and the diaspora.

The text also quotes the scene from inside. One passage notes that nasty business has already mashed up the place, and that the hour would now be for love songs and for the records of others, giving them signal, lyrics, videos and riddim. The reference to nasty business, the hard current of current bouyon, and the nod to the name Signal, show an author who knows the codes of the genre he is joining, its currents and its actors. That is the difference between a bouyon record on order and a bouyon record written from inside: “Bouyon Mood” comments on the genre at the same time as it practices it.

Finally, the verses close the loop opened in 2020. The text tells the early scepticism, the bringing of his own flows, then the line attributed to Tridel, the upset of the time, and the resolution to join what he could not beat. The 2025 single therefore answers, lyrics against lyrics, the 2020 single, and both pages exist on the same artist page: the listener can check the whole arc in two plays. Few files of this wave offer such a readable trace of a central bouyon debate, who can represent Dominica and through which sound, carried by a single catalog.

“Eat Dat Up”, the 2026 sequel, and the limits of the file

The catalog does not stop in 2025. The most recent release on the artist page is “Eat Dat Up”, featuring Real Reel, a single released on July 3, 2026 under the TriSzy banner itself, in English, at 160 BPM. The page, opened for this profile, credits Tristan Shillingford and Corel Domnique on vocals, Shillingford as songwriter, SAVION as producer and Judah Jno Baptiste as mixing engineer. Two changes can be read there: the banner is no longer ThaMixedBreedz but the artist name, and the feature pairs TriSzy with Real Reel, a name of the same Dominican new wave. The record shows 2 Shazam identifications at the time of opening: it is a brand new release, not yet an established record, and this profile says so.

Put end to end, the facts draw a coherent and bounded path. A rapper trained in American hip hop, schooled in Dominica, who builds for five years an Island Pop catalog under his own banner, debates the place of bouyon in song from 2020, disappears from the platforms for close to three years, then returns in 2025 with a grave record and a bouyon single that becomes the centre of his press and his listening. Fr3EzE producing that single and Tha WizZarD mixing it plug him into the workshop of the current wave, documented on this site in the profile of Tha WizZarD, and his features link him to Colton T, to Shelly and to Real Reel.

The limits of the file are clear, and this profile states them like the other pages of the site. The numbers are small and dated: 672 identifications in total on the Shazam artist page, pages at 7 or 2 identifications for the recent singles, and a YouTube count of 6,000 views recorded by the press in May 2025, which has moved since without any more recent count being opened. Two collaborations quoted by the press, “Inside Me” with Colton T and “Bum Pain” with Shelly, have no platform page found: they are reported here as press facts, and excluded from the verified track list. No official account of the artist was verified by direct opening during this research: the only link carried in the structured data is the Shazam artist page, opened and quoted above.

The recommended listening follows the arc of the file: “If Is One Thing” for the question of 2020, “Best Believe” for the rap sound of origin, “Di Code” for the grave register, then the 2025 run, “Bouyon Mood”, “Bend & Bounce” and “Gade Sa”, and “Eat Dat Up” for the state of the catalog in 2026. The context is read on our bouyon soca page and in our bouyon playlist, which follows the current Dominican wave, the one TriSzy ended up joining after discussing it in song for five years.

Frequently asked questions

Who is TriSzy?

TriSzy is the artist name of Tristan Shillingford, a singer and rapper born in Brooklyn who returned to Dominica as a child, attending Convent Preparatory School and Dominica Grammar School, then moved back to the United States. He began music there as a rapper with the collective The Mixed Breed, and he describes his style as Island Pop, a blend of hip hop, R&B, dancehall and soca. The platform credits confirm the name: Tristan Shillingford is credited as songwriter on “Bend & Bounce” and “Gade Sa”, and on vocals on “Eat Dat Up”.

What is the TriSzy bouyon record?

“Bouyon Mood”, released in April 2025, which the general press often shortens to “Mood”. According to the Caribbean press, it was produced by Fr3EzE and mixed and mastered by Tha WizZarD, and it had passed 6,000 views on YouTube by May 2025. The Shazam page of the record is published on April 18, 2025, and the artist page ranks it among his most streamed songs.

Which TriSzy records are verified on the platforms?

The Shazam artist page, opened for this profile, lists “Farenheit” and “Take Off” in 2020, “If Is One Thing” the same year, “Mixbreed”, “Pretty N Clean” and “Glow” in 2021, “Best Believe” and “I’m Not Sowi” in 2022, “Di Code”, “Bouyon Mood”, “Bend & Bounce” and “Gade Sa” in 2025, and “Eat Dat Up”, with Real Reel, in 2026. The records “Inside Me”, with Colton T, and “Bum Pain”, with Shelly, are known from the press only and do not figure in that list.

Why did TriSzy make a bouyon record after defending hip hop?

Because the debate is old in his work. In 2020, “If Is One Thing” answered the line that only bouyon can make it out of Dominica, a line the lyrics of “Bouyon Mood” attribute to Tridel. In the 2025 interviews, he explains that he is no longer trying to prove that hip hop can represent Dominica, but that he wanted to test himself creatively: to see whether he could sing on a bouyon track. He also states that it is bouyon time now, without soca being left behind for all that.

On which banner does TriSzy release his records?

Most of the opened pages carry the ThaMixedBreedz banner, which takes the name of his original collective, The Mixed Breed: “Best Believe” in 2022, “Bend & Bounce” and “Gade Sa” in 2025 carry it on Shazam. The 2026 single, “Eat Dat Up”, is released under the TriSzy banner itself, according to its page.

What is missing from the public TriSzy file?

Several pieces. No official account verified by direct opening during this research, apart from the Shazam artist page. No platform page found for “Inside Me” and “Bum Pain”, although the press quotes them. No explanation of the release pause between 2022 and 2025. And modest, dated listening figures: 672 identifications in total on Shazam at the time of research. This profile will be completed if the artist publishes a biography or fuller pages.

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