Web Posted - Tuesday March 29, 2022
The Daily Herald

Dow Foundation to host concert in Indianapolis

Philipsburg, Sint Maarten, W.I. - Dow’s Musical Foundation plans to take steelpan music to Indianapolis, Indiana.

Foundation founder Isidore “Mighty Dow” York shared his exciting plans for taking steelpan music beyond St. Maarten’s 37 square miles. He said that he always had the desire to perform with his Ebony Steel Orchestra for audiences abroad and use such opportunities to promote St. Maarten and its culture. This was made possible recently during a chance encounter with Richard Isidore Page and his company, Richards Events. Page is a St. Maartener who currently lives in Indiana.

Page expressed interest in assisting York and his foundation with organising performances for the steel pan group in Indianapolis, Indiana. This led to York travelling to Indianapolis for a 10-day visit, where he was further introduced to Mary Clark, Executive Director of International Marketplace and Indianapolis Global Village.
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Web Posted - Monday March 28, 2022
Trinidad and Tobago Newsday

Soca artiste “Blaxx” dies of COVID at 59

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. - Soca artiste Dexter “Blaxx” Stewart has died.
 

D’All Starz, of which he is the lead singer, issued a statement saying his family, along with the management and members of the band D’All Starz, regretted having to announce his untimely passing.
 

....On March 21 it was reported that Blaxx was hospitalised at the Arima General Hospital battling COVID-19.
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Web Posted - Saturday March 26, 2022
Soca News

Steelpan to play for the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee

England, U.K. - One hundred steelpan players drawn from four of the UK’s top steel bands will play for Her Majesty at the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations at Buckingham Palace on Sunday 5 June.

The combined steel band will be formed of 25 players from each of the four bands: Ebony Steelband, Mangrove Steelband, Croydon Steel Orchestra and Metronomes.

Appropriately, in the centenary year of the Grandmaster’s birth, the music will be Pan in A Minor and London is the Place for Me by the late Lord Kitchener (Aldwyn Roberts), arranged by André White. Pans will be tuned by “Birch” Kelman and Dudley Dickson, and the musical director for the performance is to be Leon Foster Thomas.
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Web Posted - Tuesday March 22, 2022
Antigua Observer

Three Antiguans to compete in this year’s PanoGrama

Maurisha Potter, Malik Smith, Jawan Henry

Antigua & Barbuda, W.I. - Three panists from Antigua and Barbuda will be competing against 24 other musicians from across the world in the third annual PanoGrama competition.

PanoGrama is an international steelpan competition which takes place in the virtual space each year.

Maurisha Potter, Malik Smith and Jawan Henry are the local talents who will be flying the twin island nation’s flag in this year’s event.

Potter, the current captain of the Panache Steel Orchestra, said that she is “looking forward” to representing Antigua and Barbuda once again.
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Web Posted - Saturday March 19, 2022
Trinidad & Tobago Guardian

Mia to keep Massy Trinidad All Stars ahead of the game

 Dr Mia Gormandy-Benjamin conducts the Massy Trinidad All Stars Steel Orchestra at Classical Jewels in 2019.

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. - Massy Trinidad All Stars Steel Orchestra has a new artistic director and she intends to keep the 86-year-old steelband—the world’s oldest—ahead of the competition.

Dr Mia Gormandy-Benjamin was recently appointed as artistic director, charged with overseeing the musical and creative elements of Trinidad All-Stars, of which the orchestra’s rehearsals are a part.

Rehearsals are an important routine for an orchestra to be at its best when the curtains are drawn at showtime. Gormandy-Benjamin recently told Sunday Guardian she plans to tighten the ship a bit.

“I aim to make rehearsals and meetings more efficient by encouraging performers to show up on time, work towards a common goal, and finish at a reasonable time. The more we get done in a timely manner the better as the outcome would be greater,” she said.
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Web Posted - Tuesday March 15, 2022
When Steel Talks

Owen Matthew Michael Serrette - ‘The Celebration of Life’ - Live Stream

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. - Former president of Pan Trinbago and managing director of Solo Harmonites & Pan Knights steel orchestras, Owen Serrette, passed away on March 6, 2022.

....It was during his return as a primary school student that Serrette first got involved with the steelband. At the age of ten he played with City Syncopators for the Carnival of 1950. At that time, calypsonians and steelbandsmen were considered “outcasts,” as eulogised in Sparrow’s calypso “Outcast” - with the famous lyrics: “If yuh sister talk to a steelbandman, yuh family want to break she hand, put she out, outcast.”

The celebration of Serrette’s life is on March 15 at the Church of the Nativity in Petit Valley, Trinidad; it is being live streamed.
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Web Posted - Friday March 11, 2022
Trinidad and Tobago Newsday

Ray Holman’s Pan on the Move marks 50 years with film

Len “Boogsie” Sharpe, who, until 1972, was a player with Starlift, where Holman was arranger

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. - Carnival 1972 was a standout year in Trinidad and Tobago’s festival history, not just because of its postponement from February to May in response to a polio outbreak. It was also the year Ray Holman revolutionised Panorama with his ground-breaking Pan on the Move.

Now, 50 years later, the story of the song’s creation; the professional challenges it created for Holman; and the ways in which the piece became a turning point in steelband history are all being showcased in a new documentary that premieres on March 13.

A collaboration between Mark Loquan Music and Gerelle Forbes of Sthenic22, the seed for the documentary was planted not long after Holman released his 2020 album First Love.

....The landmark Pan on the Move documentary premieres on Sunday, first during Duvone Stewart’s Pan Chronicles programme on Facebook in the afternoon, then later that evening on the Mark Loquan Music YouTube channel.
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Web Posted - Tuesday March 8, 2022
Caribbean Life

WIADCA mourns death of ‘Carnival Queen’ Joyce Quamina

New York, USA - The Brooklyn-based West Indian American Day Carnival Association (WIADCA), organizer of the annual massive carnival parade on Brooklyn’s Eastern Parkway, says it’s “deeply saddened” over the passing of one of its former stalwart executive members, Trinidadian Joyce Quamina, described as WIADCA’s “Carnival Queen.”

Quamina, a long-time Brooklyn resident, died on March 1 – incidentally, the same day as “Carnival Tuesday” in Trinidad and Tobago – at Mount Sinai South Nassau Hospital in Oceanside, Long Is., her only daughter, Michelle Quamina told Caribbean Life. Quamina was 85.

“A true community stalwart and lead on our Pan Committee, Auntie Joyce steered our organization through some rough days where she served in many other areas,” said WIADCA.

....Michelle Quamina told Caribbean Life that her mom was involved with carnival up to her passing.

....She said that, after nearly 30 years of service, Quamina, in March 2002, tendered her resignation from WIADCA.

“But it was not the last,” said Michelle, disclosing that, in 2010,” her mother was “recommissioned to coordinate what is perhaps the most difficult event on the carnival calendar, the Steelband Panorama, which she successfully did for the last 10 years.”
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Web Posted - Monday March 7, 2022
Trinidad and Tobago Newsday

Past Pan Trinbago president Owen Serrette has died

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. - Past Pan Trinbago president Owen Serrette has died. He was 82.

The news of his passing was shared on the organisation’s Facebook page as well as on the pages of several bands. Serrette led the organisation from 1988 to 1996.

Pan Trinbago’s vice president Keith Simpson said Serrette died on Sunday morning. He added that Serrette had been ailing for some time and had a stroke.
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Web Posted - Saturday March 5, 2022
Trinidad Express Newspapers

MEN OF STEEL - Tobago super duo outshine veteran arrangers in de Big Yard

BRIGHT STARS: Silver Stars arrangers Ojay Richards, left and Kersh Ramsey square off during Republic Day celebrations at Shaw Park, Tobago last year. The Tobago-born UTT duo shocked all comers when their arrangement of Voice’s (Aaron St Louis) “Out & Bad” won the Unipet Elliot “Ellie” Manette People’s Choice Award at last Saturday’s Pan Trinbago Musical Showdown In De Big Yard, held at the Queen’s Park Savannah, Port of Spain..

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. - Two young pan arrangers shocked the fraternity with an innovative attention-grabbing score at Pan Trinbago’s Musical Showdown in De Big Yard, last Saturday, at the Queen’s Park Savannah, Port of Spain.

Tobago-born duo Ojay Richards, 30, and Kersh Ramsey, 27, together led Nutrien Silver Stars Steel Orchestra to the biggest accolade up for grabs in the large band category of the showcase: the Unipet Elliot “Ellie” Mannette People’s Choice Award.

....While no doubt impressive, Richards said the achievement should be kept in perspective as he believes the approach would be different from all bands on a competition night.

....“This People’s Choice holds some sort of merit, but it doesn’t say we are the champions. The Panorama battle is on a musical standpoint, so you have to check the judges’ sheets and look at things like: melodic development and motific development.

“....We are very grateful for winning de people’s choice, but we still understand that this wasn’t the actual competition and if it was it would have been a different approach,” Richards explained.
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Web Posted - Wednesday March 2, 2022
When Steel Talks

Silver Stars Steel Orchestra Receives People’s Choice Award

Marcus Ash (right) of Silver Stars accepts the Unipet People’s Choice Award from Rupert Jones (left)

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. - Silver Stars Steel Orchestra was presented with the Unipet Elliot “Ellie” Mannette People’s Choice Award at a simple ceremony on March 2 at the office of Pan Trinbago.

The specially-commissioned trophy designed by Clifton Lawrence of Decorative Glass, was presented to the winner in the Large conventional steel orchestra category by Mr. Rupert Jones, Corporate Secretary, himself a panist.

Marcus Ash, Silver Stars Drill Master collected on behalf of Silver  Stars.
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Web Posted - February 2020
When Steel Talks

Complete Summary of Results of all Conventional Steel Orchestras - 2020 Trinidad & Tobago National Panorama

Trinidad & Tobago, W.I. - At a glance and on a single page, access the comprehensive summary of results for the Small, Medium and Large conventional steel orchestras that participated in their respective categories in the 2020 Panorama.

Follow the musical journey of respective bands through all three phases - compare side-by-side preliminaries, semi-finals and finals through data on band info, scores, tunes of choice and arrangers - on one page.
access full summary