Les Slater, Neville Jules and Borough President Eric Adams - photo by Colin Williams
Brooklyn, New York - On Sunday evening, April 26 2015, they gathered in impressive numbers and from as far away as Canada to salute Neville Jules, a truly iconic figure from the annals of steel band lore in Trinidad and Tobago. Occasion was a celebratory dinner honoring Jules presented by the Trinidad & Tobago Folk Arts Institute, venue of which was Brooklyn’s Tropical Paradise Ballroom.
Neville Jules & Wife - photo by Colin Williams
Topping the accolades conferred on Jules were citations from three New York City elected officials: Congresswoman Yvette Clarke, Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams and City Council Member Jumane Williams. Adams was on hand to present his proclamation; Williams, a late-hour absentee due to a Council Budget Committee meeting, was represented by Ernest Skinner, his community liaison; and Clarke, unable to attend because of a prior engagement, was represented by Lystra Collis of the Congressional Office.
Jules, now nearing his 88th birthday, was in high spirits for the entire evening, responding in animated fashion when musical tribute was paid him via selections he arranged for legendary Trinidad All Stars that he led for more than two decades, from the 1940s to the start of the 70s. He was a key contributing presence in the core group whose inspired ingenuity gave rise to the steel band culture in the 1940s and was responsible for a number of innovations in the early period of the steel band’s development.
Assuming from early the hands-on guidance of Trinidad All Stars’ musical direction, one of the features Jules introduced that has endured to the present time was the “bomb” tune played by steel bands on the Carnival roadways and which primarily consisted, when the tradition was begun in the 1950s, of reconfiguring classical pieces for the road. This tradition started by Jules and followed by other steel bands, was taken up as well by dance orchestras of the period in Trinidad and Tobago. At the April 26 tribute, Aldwin Albino, pianist and arranger for the Norman ‘Tex’ Williams Orchestra, was present to publicly thank Jules for his original classic-turned-calypso rendition that sparked the Williams orchestra’s popularity, the immortal “Minuet in G.”
Jules, who has been a New York resident since the early 1970s, remarkably furnished “bomb” tune material for Trinidad All Stars even into his eighties.
Solid representation from the Trinidad All Stars USA organization was in the house, and they made a presentation to Jules of a photograph of himself taken by one of the All Stars members, Gerry Carter. Well-wishers at the tribute also included many from the Trinidad All Stars family of panists and masqueraders from the “Fleet’s In” days of the ‘50s and ‘60s to the present. Among them was Hamilton Alexander, now domiciled in Canada, who succeeded Jules as the band’s skipper when the man they all still call “The Captain” migrated to the U.S.
Neville Jules and members of Trinidad All Stars Association USA - photo by Colin Williams
Jules, overjoyed and clearly awed by the occasion, received the Folk Arts Institute’s Citation of Merit, only the second individual from the steel band ranks to be so honored by the organization, the other having been Ellie Mannette.
click for more on Les Slater; contact him at slater.pro40@gmail.com
Leave a comment in the WST forum