Denise Belfon put in the “Work” nearly three decades ago. Now, the Trinidadian soca legend says she is finally getting paid for it — and Drake helped make that happen.

Belfon says Drake and his team played a pivotal role in ensuring that she began receiving royalties from future uses of her unmistakable vocals from Work, the soca classic that has been sampled and repurposed repeatedly since its release.

The development represents a major turn in a royalty saga stretching back decades.

According to Belfon, years of disputes surrounding the rights to the recording left her without the financial benefits she believes should have accompanied the song’s enduring popularity.

Then Drake entered the picture.

Belfon said the Canadian superstar’s team helped untangle the rights situation and ensure that she would receive royalties going forward whenever the recording is sampled.

For an artiste whose voice has travelled far beyond Trinidad and Tobago — sometimes without the money following it — the intervention was significant.

The voice had been collecting samples. Now Belfon could finally start collecting royalties.

But the story isn’t over.

Belfon says she is still pursuing backpay connected to thousands of previous recordings that sampled or incorporated her vocals before the royalty situation was resolved.

That could potentially turn a decades-old Caribbean recording into a substantial rights battle.

The case also highlights an uncomfortable reality that has followed Caribbean music for generations: sounds and vocals created in the region can become valuable ingredients in international records while the original performers struggle to receive their share of the financial rewards.

Sampling has helped carry dancehall, reggae and soca into some of the biggest records in global popular music. But behind those familiar voices and rhythms are often complicated questions about ownership, publishing, master recordings and who actually gets paid when an old Caribbean record finds a lucrative second life.

For Belfon, that second life has been remarkably long.

Her vocals have survived changing musical eras, crossed borders and continued finding their way into new recordings decades after she first stepped behind the microphone.

Now she wants the paper trail to catch up with the music.

And while Drake may be one of the biggest stars on the planet, his most important contribution to this particular story may have happened away from the microphone.

Nearly 30 years after Belfon did the “Work,” she says somebody finally helped make sure the money could work its way back to her.

Now comes the harder question: What about all those years of backpay?