Stooping-Kafele, left, and Renee, middle-Nicholas Gosine, Daddy Sparks, Dianne Sparks (daughter) Darion (baby) Racine James. Back– Anthony, Tono, Akeem Shaq.

Come Carnival 2010, Fitz-Gerald Sparks will be 79 years young and still playing tenor pan for his beloved Starlift Steelband for Panorama—even though he’s been walking on crutches over the last eight years. “Daddy Sparks,” as he’s fondly called in the home circle of Lady Hailes Avenue in San Fernando, has seen it all and done it all in the name of steelpan—playing roles from tuner to arranger to captain to manager of a host of steelbands throughout the length and breath of Trinidad. Sparks’ career in the national instrument of T&T started in 1942 at a tender age of eleven, in Palo Seco, with a band called Sunvalley Serenaders, later to become Eighth Army and then Black Eagles. Following Carnival in 1946, Sparks went to live in Oropouche, where he tuned his first pan for Carlos and Gabriel Rose.

Sparks believes that he might very well be the first pannist to perform at social events such as garden parties and social evenings where the guests were strictly “white folks”. That was at TLL Forest Reserve Manager’s Residence, as well as the staff club. In 1947, since his father was employed in the oil industry—with Trinidad Leasehold Ltd—he went back to Pao Seco to live and as fate would have it he inherited the captaincy of the band upon the departure of the then captain Mickey Smith. In those war days, Sparks affirmed, to be captain you had to be able to tune pans as well as arrange music. He claims to be the first player to use two sticks to play the ping pong and affirms that from his knowledge Mikey Smith was the first man to tune a pan from an oil drum—that was in 1945. In 1949, Mikey Smith returned to Palo Seco and restructured the band, changing its name to Casbah Steel Orchestra.

In 1951, Sparks regained captaincy of the band, introducing the caustic soda drum in place of the biscuit drum for making bass pans. Sparks then saw himself being chosen, with Allan Gervais and Vin Courtney, among others, to tune and assist other bands in the southern region who were without pan tuners. In 1956, Casbah Steelband met its demise, leading to the founding of yet another outfit in Federal Steelband, for which he was the tuner/arranger and also played tenor and double seconds with three sticks—a technique which Sparks posits that Allan Gervais, his contemporary from Point Fortin, invented. The pan maestro had a playing stint with Merry Makers in 1956, then with Casablanca in 1958 then Trinidad All Stars from 1959 to 1964, followed by Sundowners in 1963, since Trinidad All Stars did not participate in Panorama that year. The year 1965 saw him formally gaining membership of Sundowners, where he became the PRO and eventually captain.

In 1967, the ace pannist joined the ranks of Texaco West Stars for Music Festival, whereupon he was asked to remain. He obliged and became a committee member. He eventually took over the helm in 1979. Upon the demise of West Stars in 1989, Sparks’ penchant for percussion did not wane so he became a member of Hatters from 1990 to 1996, then Skiffle Bunch from 1996 to 1998 and Casablanca from 1998 to 2000, followed by Starlift in 2000 to the present. Sparks boasts of having played every instrument in the pan family and has a good knowledge of all of them but his pan of choice is the double tenors—though at the moment he plays the single tenor. The proud pan elder, who was a construction worker, feels elated in stating that many prominent panmen, arrangers and tuners have gone through his tutelage.