Sean Nero

The man­age­ment of four-time Na­tion­al Panora­ma cham­pi­on So­lo Har­monites Steel Or­ches­tra does not take the com­mit­ment of its mem­bers who rep­re­sent the brand light­ly, says op­er­a­tions man­ag­er Owen Ser­rette.

He said the band, in spite of its chal­lenges, con­tin­ues to serve as a bea­con in the Mor­vant/Barataria com­mu­ni­ties, while adding pos­i­tive­ly to the mu­si­cal land­scape of T&T.Ser­rette was speak­ing at Har­monites' ap­pre­ci­a­tion func­tion held last Sun­day at its head­quar­ters at the in­ter­sec­tion of Mor­vant Junc­tion and the Churchill-Roo­sevelt High­way. Mem­bers of the band were the toast.

He laud­ed the splen­did year 2012 was for Har­monites: plac­ing fifth in Panora­ma with new arranger Seion Gomez; stag­ing it full length con­cert at the Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts; and leav­ing its mu­si­cal mark at var­i­ous na­tion­al and com­mu­ni­ty fes­ti­vals.At the func­tion, Ser­rette took the op­por­tu­ni­ty to ral­ly the troops in the lead up to the 2013 Na­tion­al Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tion staged by Pan Trin­ba­go.

"Panora­ma is what every steel­band per­son lives for. We are aim­ing to be the 2013 cham­pi­on band. We are not in Panora­ma to be in the fi­nals. We see the in­gre­di­ents that have been miss­ing and all we have to do it is put our shoul­ders to the wheel," he said.He then turned his at­ten­tion to Joseph Charles Bot­tling Works, the mak­er of So­lo Bev­er­ages and spon­sor of the band.Ser­rette said the com­pa­ny had a spe­cial re­la­tion­ship not on­ly with the band, but the com­mu­ni­ty of Cale­do­nia, a com­mit­ment the lo­cal man­u­fac­tur­er in­tend­ed to main­tain.