SAN­DRA L BLOOD

blood­san­dral@ya­hoo.com

Feb­ru­ary is known to the pan and cul­ture world when in­tense Panora­ma re­hearsals and com­pe­ti­tions are in full swing. But sad­ly, Feb­ru­ary 11 marks 22 years since the pass­ing of the late great pride of Ari­ma, Grand Mas­ter of Ca­lyp­so, and pro­lif­ic com­pos­er of tunes de­scribed as be­fit­ting for pan, Ald­wyn “Lord Kitch­en­er” Roberts.

On April 18 will be his 100th birth­day and to en­sure his lega­cy’s re­spect­ed, re­mains rel­e­vant and alive, a team of lo­cal and in­ter­na­tion­al pro­fes­sion­als, en­tre­pre­neurs and cul­tur­al com­mu­ni­ty ac­tivists pre­dom­i­nant­ly from Ari­ma, is plan­ning a one-year com­mem­o­ra­tion from the birth­date to April 17 of next year, 2023.

The Ari­ma Re­brand­ing Team (ART) is spear­head­ed by for­mer ed­u­ca­tion cur­ricu­lum co­or­di­na­tor, in­ter­na­tion­al ed­u­ca­tion con­sul­tant and com­mu­ni­ty ac­tivist, Hen­ry Saun­ders, with its core rep­re­sen­ta­tion be­ing Don­ald Baldeosingh, Thomas Isaac, Den­nis Hicks, James Tou­s­saint. In part, the team com­pris­es in­ter­na­tion­al pro­fes­sors in ed­u­ca­tion, IT ex­perts, an­thro­pol­o­gist and in­ter­na­tion­al lawyers.

ART is a bonafide reg­is­tered not-for-prof­it NGO, and func­tions with its sign­post: ser­vice and hu­mil­i­ty.

Themed All Things Kitch­en­er–the brain­child of Kendall Reyes–the launch an­tic­i­pat­ed to be on Kitch­en­er’s birth­date in­cludes in part, an in­ter-faith ser­vice in Ari­ma at 9.00 am, a street pa­rade, and a free, gala, vir­tu­al, cul­tur­al­ly-mixed trib­ute fea­tur­ing top lo­cal and in­ter­na­tion­al artistes.

The 45th and cur­rent May­or of Ari­ma, Cagney Casimire, ex­pressed ela­tion: “Ari­ma is a pow­er­ful and ex­treme­ly spe­cial cul­tur­al, his­tor­i­cal, ed­u­ca­tion­al and tourism-wor­thy bor­ough. It’s the on­ly Roy­al Char­tered Bor­ough in the west­ern hemi­sphere, and leads the na­tion by be­ing the bor­ough with the most sin­gle-pan bands.

“I ful­ly en­dorse the team’s ini­tia­tive, and I’m proud that the event is go­ing to be ex­e­cut­ed, with two of the key as­pects be­ing the re-nam­ing of a ma­jor street in Kitch­en­er’s name, and a Kitch­en­er Park,” stat­ed Casimire.

To en­sure a suc­cess­ful sol­id cel­e­bra­tion, Saun­ders said he tapped on the shoul­ders of a ro­bust and di­verse range of or­gan­i­sa­tions, and ow­ing to the in­tense need for funds, he’s an­tic­i­pat­ing co-op­er­a­tion from the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty to be a part of this one-of-a-kind aus­pi­cious oc­ca­sion.

“We are look­ing for­ward to their part­ner­ship to en­sure our con­certs and var­ied com­pe­ti­tions are ex­e­cut­ed suc­cess­ful­ly.

“Some events are self-sus­tain­ing, and are be­ing planned in col­lab­o­ra­tion with na­tion­al cul­tur­al or­gan­i­sa­tions.”

A 100-page All Things Kitch­en­er col­lec­tor’s item mag­a­zine de­pict­ing the life and mu­sic of the Grand Mas­ter is an el­e­ment of the com­mem­o­ra­tion.

Some ac­tiv­i­ties iden­ti­fied for the year “that re­quire ma­jor col­lab­o­ra­tive and fi­nan­cial sup­port are, a Kitch­en­er cul­tur­al car­a­van; talks, me­dia events on Kitch­en­er, ex­hi­bi­tions and sym­po­siums; vi­su­al and per­form­ing arts (VA­PA) com­pe­ti­tions, train­ing and de­vel­op­ment projects; a mon­u­men­tal space for Ari­ma icons; a Kitch­en­er arte­facts mu­se­um…; em­bell­ish­ment of Kitch­en­er’s grave to­wards be­com­ing a his­tor­i­cal site; and a Kitch­en­er Culi­nary Cre­ations.”

Kitch­en­er is a ca­lyp­so icon non-sur­pass from the in­cep­tion of his en­trance in the are­na, not­ed for his im­pec­ca­ble wardrobe, his sig­na­ture hats, his dance on one foot while kick­ing out the oth­er dur­ing per­for­mances, and his tunes be­ing played the most times dur­ing Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tions.

Rain-o-Ra­ma, lo­cat­ed at his fam­i­ly’s home on the Diego Mar­tin Main Road, re­mains an il­lus­tri­ous tourist at­trac­tion.

While many steel­bands played Kitch’s tunes for Panora­ma, hand in glove with his mu­sic was bp Rene­gades steel or­ches­tra (RSO).

RSO re­mains the un­beat­en large-band hat-trick cham­pi­on since 1997, hav­ing played Kitch­en­er’s Four Lara Four in 1995, Pan in a Rage, 1996 and Gui­tar Pan, 1997.

Saun­ders said he is mak­ing a spe­cial ap­peal to gov­ern­ment min­istries, and the cor­po­rate and busi­ness sec­tors to as­sist in the best in­ter­est of T&T, cul­ture and the per­form­ing arts, and most of all, to pre­serve Kitch’s lega­cy.

To as­sist and/or for fur­ther in­for­ma­tion:

Call or mes­sage: 780.7921 |

Email: hen­rysau@gmail.com