Pe­ter Ray Blood

This week­end the na­tion­al in­stru­ment is on the front­burn­er as Pan Trin­ba­go holds the se­mi-fi­nals for four cat­e­gories of the Na­tion­al Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tion.

The se­mi-fi­nals for Sin­gle Pan and Small steel­bands will be held to­mor­row at the Queen's Park Sa­van­nah, from noon. On Sun­day, at the same venue and time, it will be the turn for medi­um and large or­ches­tras to face the judges.

Com­pe­ti­tion is ex­pect­ed to be keen and fierce in each cat­e­go­ry, es­pe­cial­ly among the large bands, es­pe­cial­ly with eight past na­tion­al cham­pi­ons among the 15 se­mi-fi­nal­ists.

This year, its ri­vals will al­so be mak­ing a de­ter­mined ef­fort to de­ny de­fend­ing cham­pi­on Petrotrin Phase II Pan Groove from achiev­ing a hat­trick, a feat that is rare in the com­pe­ti­tion. In fact, since 1963, on­ly one steel or­ches­tra–Rene­gades–has ever se­cured a hat­trick of vic­to­ries in the Na­tion­al Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tion.

Sun­day's show, brand­ed as Sa­van­nah Par­ty, is al­so ex­pect­ed to be a mu­sic feast as just two bands are play­ing the same se­lec­tion, al­so a rare oc­curence in Panora­ma in the large band cat­e­go­ry. They are To­ba­go's RBTT Re­demp­tion Sound Set­ters and NGC La Brea Nightin­gales who are play­ing De Fos­to's Pan on de Road.

This cat­e­go­ry has al­ways had bands play­ing the same tune of choice, es­pe­cial­ly in the 1975 fi­nal when sev­en of the eight fi­nal­ists played the same se­lec­tion–Kitch­en­er's Trib­ute to Spree Si­mon.

Come Sun­day, ex­pect to hear some of the sweet­est melodies com­posed in any cat­e­go­ry of ca­lyp­so this year. Falling in­to this rank­ing are De Puna Band, com­posed by Pel­ham God­dard, record­ed by Farmer Nap­py, and played by Re­pub­lic Band Ex­o­dus; Robert Greenidge's Pan Hoo Ray, record­ed by Su­perBlue, and per­formed by Wit­co Des­per­a­does; and, Len "Boogsie" Sharpe's Hap­pi­ness, record­ed by Olatun­ji, and per­formed by Phase II.

It would be in­ter­est­ing to hear how some arrangers and mu­si­cians cope with com­po­si­tions that con­tain a num­ber of chord changes, like Shanaqua's Out­ta de Box, to be played by Har­monites, with arrange­ment by Seion Gomez, and Clive Tele­maque's Un­ques­tion­able, sung by Shel­don Reid, and to be played by Massy Trinidad All Stars.

Sun­day al­so promis­es to be a show­case of the best pan arrangers in the land as they pit their skill against each oth­er. Among them are pre­vi­ous win­ning na­tion­al com­pe­ti­tion arrangers Leon "Smooth" Ed­wards, God­dard, Greenidge and Sharpe, while 11 have nev­er copped a na­tion­al ti­tle.

Big fete with­the Saints

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Fete With The Saints was big. Big venue; big stage; big sound; big mu­sic; big food bar.

Held last Sat­ur­day by St Mary's Col­lege Past Stu­dents' Union, it was the first time that this an­nu­al Car­ni­val fund-rais­er was not be­ing held at the col­lege's Pem­broke Street premis­es, but on its ex­pan­sive grounds on Ser­pen­tine Road, St Clair.

From the on­set the event's or­gan­is­ers seemed in­tent on mak­ing a favourable im­pres­sion as, for the first time at the en­trance to the fete, they per­son­al­ly greet­ed ar­riv­ing guests.

Ush­ered through il­lu­mi­nat­ed, white, in­flat­ed arch­es, guests were greet­ed to an im­mac­u­late floor plan, its lay­out and decor done by Ul­ti­mate Events which was al­so re­spon­si­ble for an ul­tra-ef­fi­cient clean-up crew the en­tire night.

The food court was ex­pan­sive as it was dizzy­ing be­cause of its sump­tu­ous and var­ied ar­ray of cui­sine choic­es.

With a flaw­less sound sys­tem by Rent a Amp, DJ Pri­vate Ryan hyped up the fete un­til Roy Cape All Stars com­menced its per­for­mance at 7 pm, one hour af­ter the par­ty be­gan. Olatun­ji, who once was part of the band, guest­ed with the ag­gre­ga­tion.

All Stars was fol­lowed by guest per­for­mances by Ker­win Dubois and Ben­jai.

Some two hours sep­a­rat­ed the All Stars per­for­mance from that of Machel Mon­tano, reign­ing In­ter­na­tion­al Pow­er So­ca Monarch. From his first item, Like ah Boss, it be­came clear that it would be ex­treme­ly dif­fi­cult, if not im­pos­si­ble, for his ri­vals to take away the ti­tle this year.

He gave a per­for­mance of the song that was rem­i­nis­cent of a fi­nal per­for­mance, sans props.

Through­out his per­for­mance Mon­tano had pa­trons in the palm of his hand, hold­ing glow sticks aloft, danc­ing and fol­low­ing his every in­struc­tion and singing along with him, even when he didn't ask them to. Farmer Nap­py and Lyrikal guest­ed with Mon­tano.

I un­der­stand the or­gan­is­ers had to put a stop to the sale of tick­ets, deny­ing some 500 ad­di­tion­al will­ing pa­trons. Next year they will sim­ply have to ex­pand the par­ty space even more.

At the end of the par­ty, pa­trons chipped on the street to their ve­hi­cles to the sweet sounds of Carib Wood­brook Play­boyz.

Pan spon­sors night

Spon­sors night is a rel­a­tive­ly new trend in the steel­band world. It is host­ed by steel or­ches­tras in their pa­n­yard for spon­sors. Aside from win­ing and din­ing spe­cial­ly in­vit­ed guests, these events pro­vide an op­por­tu­ni­ty for spon­sors to get up-close and per­son­al with the pan mu­si­cians in the rus­tic and pul­sat­ing en­vi­ron­ment of the pa­n­yard. It is al­so an op­por­tu­ni­ty for band jer­seys to be dis­trib­uted and the band to give spon­sors a first lis­ten to its Panora­ma se­lec­tion.

Spon­sors Night com­menced on Tues­day at CAL In­vaders pa­n­yard on Tra­garete Road, Wood­brook, with of­fi­cials of the na­tion­al air­line at­tend­ing in large num­bers. They min­gled with man­age­ment of the band, in­clud­ing man­ag­er Michael Din­chong, PRO Liz Nam­soo, arranger Ard­din Her­bert, George Matthews, De­siree My­ers, Ja­son Ho, Crys­tal Ben­thum and Jim In­niss, the longest-serv­ing mem­ber of the band.

Among the CAL of­fi­cials seen were di­rec­tor Pa­tri­cia Kong Ting, CEO Michael R DiLol­lo, CFO Ty­rone Tang, VP (com­mer­cial op­er­a­tions and cus­tomer ser­vice) George Reeleer, Ali­cia Cabr­era, Sharon Mar­quez-Dass and Sherene Boatswain.

Guests were en­ter­tained by the band's stage side play­ing a 30-minute reper­toire, and the full band play­ing its Panora­ma se­lec­tion–Baron's This Melody Sweet.

The Na­tion­al Gas Com­pa­ny, ti­tle spon­sor of three steel­bands (NGC Cou­va Joy­lan­ders, NGC La Brea Nightin­gales and To­ba­go's NGC Steel Xplo­sion), host­ed its Spon­sors Night yes­ter­day, Thurs­day, at Jaf­fa, at the Queen's Park Oval, Wood­brook.

Massy Trinidad All Stars will host its event on Fri­day, Feb­ru­ary 6, at its Duke Street venue, the same evening Re­pub­lic Bank per­son­nel will be en­ter­tained by Ex­o­dus Steel Or­ches­tra. At All Stars, guests will be treat­ed to Clive Tele­maque's Un­ques­tion­able, with a per­for­mance by its singer Shel­don Reid. A sim­i­lar re­cep­tion can be ex­pect­ed at the East­ern Main Road am­phithe­atre of Ex­o­dus when the for­mer na­tion­al cham­pi­on per­forms Pel­ham God­dard's De Puna Band, as well as a live per­for­mance by Farmer Nap­py.

Tues­day, Feb­ru­ary 10, is the day that bpTT Rene­gades will host its event. This is tra­di­tion­al­ly a lav­ish af­fair, at­tend­ed by politi­cians, diplo­mats and dig­ni­taries from the cor­po­rate world. Rene­gades usu­al­ly dis­trib­utes its jer­sey be­fore the event and guests are re­quest­ed to wear it. As nor­mal, guests will be wel­come at Rene­gades' Char­lotte Street pa­n­yard by bpTT MD Nor­man Christie, to be treat­ed to per­for­mances by pop­u­lar artistes, in­clud­ing Denise "Saucy Wow" Bel­fon, singer of the band's Panora­ma tune of choice–Jam Dem Hard.

Black Stal­in live

As you are aware, Black Stal­in is re­cu­per­at­ing from a stroke suf­fered last year and will not be per­form­ing for Car­ni­val 2015. But, with a lit­tle help from his fans and friends, he will still earn an in­come this sea­son. Since Car­ni­val time is when most ca­lyp­so­ni­ans make a liv­ing, the CD Black Stal­in Live–Col­lec­tors Edi­tion is be­ing re-re­leased for the 2015 Car­ni­val sea­son, with all prof­its from sales go­ing to Black Stal­in.

Stal­in is ac­claimed and re­spect­ed as a spe­cial T&T artiste. He is a non-par­ti­san pa­tri­ot and a fam­i­ly man. His ca­lyp­soes have en­riched our na­tion's soul, as the good folks at UWI recog­nised when award­ing him a doc­tor­ate. He taught us to Love Yuh Own, and that We Can Make It If We Try. The me­dia has ben­e­fit­ted from Stal­in's ca­reer and this is an op­por­tu­ni­ty to re­turn the favour. His per­son­al pref­er­ence is to mar­ket his work.

The live record­ed CD Black Stal­in Live–Col­lec­tors edi­tion was pro­duced and first re­leased in 2007, and all copies were sold out. The mu­sic and arrange­ments were done by Roy Cape and the All Stars. Stal­in refers to the CD as his "best works."

Funds raised in this re-re­lease will go di­rect­ly to Black Stal­in, since every­one in­volved in the project, in­clud­ing Roy Cape, El­ton Ben­jamin, and ex­ec­u­tive pro­duc­ers

Er­ic St Bernard and Sher­rie Ann De Leon, have con­curred that all prof­its go to­Black Stal­in.

Black Stal­in Live–Col­lec­tors Edi­tion is avail­able ex­clu­sive­ly from Cros­by's, and will be sold at all Tu­co venues.

Get yours to show your love and sup­port for the Black Man.

Trib­ute is be­ing paid to Stal­in by artistes per­form­ing at this year's edi­tion of Car­ni­val Un­der the Trees at The Nor­mandie, St Ann's. Artistes like Chan­tal Es­delle & Moyenne, David Berreaux and Olatun­ji will cov­er Stal­in's hits.

The se­ries of open-air shows com­mence on Tues­day, Feb­ru­ary 3.