?The Laven­tille Steel­band Fes­ti­val Foun­da­tion (LSFF) is tak­ing pan and the com­mu­ni­ty to high­er heights by stag­ing two pre­mier events. On Sun­day, Au­gust 2nd, the foun­da­tion is stag­ing the 10th an­nu­al edi­tion of its Laven­tille Steel­band Pa­rade, re­put­ed through the years to be the "safest steel­band event in the land." Sched­uled to be­gin at 4 pm, or­gan­is­ers say that at least 32 of the na­tion's most pop­u­lar steel or­ches­tras have pledged their par­tic­i­pa­tion.

The im­pres­sive ros­ter of par­tic­i­pat­ing bands in­cludes 2009 Na­tion­al Panora­ma win­ner Sil­ver Stars, 2009 Pan Down Mem­o­ry Lane cham­pi­on An­gos­tu­ra Wood­brook Play­boyz, Petrotrin Phase II Pan Groove, Neal & Massy Trinidad All Stars, Wit­co Des­per­a­does, bpTT Rene­gades, Courts Sound Spe­cial­ists of Laven­tille, Tokyo, Sagi­cor Ex­o­dus, So­lo Pan Knights, Har­monites, High­landers and many more. The pa­rade, which be­gins at the cor­ner of the East­ern Main Road and Mc Al­lis­ter Street, and ends at the cor­ner of Leon Street in Suc­cess Vil­lage, will be pre­ced­ed, as is tra­di­tion­al, by a dance seg­ment in front of the House of An­gos­tu­ra on the EMR.

As usu­al, this spe­cial edi­tion of the fes­ti­val is ex­pect­ed to be at­tend­ed by a large turnout of dig­ni­taries, in­clud­ing Pres­i­dent George Maxwell Richards and his wife Dr Jean Ramjohn Richards, and par­lia­men­tary rep­re­sen­ta­tives who at some point in their lives called Laven­tille, or its en­vi­rons, their home. Among these cur­rent and for­mer par­lia­men­tar­i­ans are Mar­tin Joseph, Mar­lene Mac Don­ald, Emi­ly Gaynor Dick-Forde, NiLe­ung Hy­po­lite, Fitzger­ald Hinds and Eu­lalie James.

The oth­er ma­jor event be­ing un­der­tak­en by the LSFF is the stag­ing of the Gems of Laven­tille –Out­stand­ing Spir­it & Soul, (Gloss) Awards, on Ju­ly 23rd, at 7 pm, at The Glass Room of The House An­gos­tu­ra. A num­ber of de­serv­ing cit­i­zens and or­gan­i­sa­tions have been named for awards for their con­tri­bu­tion in var­i­ous spheres of com­mu­ni­ty en­deav­our.

?Gems of Laven­tille–Out­stand­ing Spir­it & Soul Awards

?Youth Awards:

2008 Pres­i­dent's Medal Win­ner Jer­melia Har­ris (Ed­u­ca­tion)

Mia Gor­mandy (Cul­ture)

Chan­tal Mc Lean (Sports)

Stephanie Pow­ers (Sports)

Adult Awards:

Neville Jules (Con­tri­bu­tion to de­vel­op­ment of na­tion­al in­stru­ment)

Ephraim Ser­rette (Com­mu­ni­ty Ser­vice)

Cor­po­rate Awards:

Chee Mooke Bak­ery

Pan­land

Spe­cial Ci­ta­tions (serv­ing min­is­ters of Gov­ern­ment from Laven­tille and en­vi­rons):

Mar­tin Joseph

Don­na Cox

Mar­lene Mac­Don­ald

Emi­ly Gaynor Dick-Forde

NiLe­ung Hy­po­lite

Spe­cial Awards:

Leroi Clarke

Senor Gomez

Joey Lewis

Phill Sim­mons

Kei­th Smith

San­dra "Singing San­dra" des Vi­gnes-Milling­ton

Leg­ends Awards:

Fitzger­ald "Mighty Ter­ror" Hen­ry

Clifton "Bomber" Ryan

Fitz Cole­man

Clive Bradley

Lin­coln "Del­ga­do" Noel