Leading up to the main parade climax, a number of Caribbean music artistes will make an appearance to Toronto where they will perform in many smaller parties held around the city by the resident Caribbean community. These parties are generally called "Fêtes" (Pronounced "fett") which is a French-creole Caribbean word meaning Festival. These Fête will usually begin in June-July and will be carried out on the weekends leading up to the parade. Many popular sites including: Toronto-Lime.com, FeteNet.com, IslandMix.com, SocaTherapy.com, TorontoCarnival.com, or KingdomOfSoca.com which are all based in Ontario make up a bulk of the online Caribbean music industry and actively promote the area's fetes. Together, they tend to promote the bulk of the Caribbean events/traditions going on in Toronto.
Each Fête held will tend have its own theme. A "Wet Fete" means usually there will be a bubbles machine at the venue which will soak party goers while they dance the night away to up tempo Soca music. The "You must wear-white Fete" means you're supposed to wear nothing but white clothing where all sorts of black light effects will make everyone's clothes a dazzling part of the party's light show. The "Mad hatters ball Fete" is a fete that you're supposed to wear your craziest head-gear/hat that you can find.