New York
- As most steelband music panorama veterans know,
where you play is almost as important, as what
you play on panorama night. Indeed, appearance/play
position can have a profound effect on one's fortune
that night,
and ultimately, what your entire season had been
geared toward, the reason of 'being.'
Panorama steel orchestras are
made up of very superstitious people. They will
send a representative to pick on their behalf who
they believe will bring good fortune to the band by
picking an appearance position that is 'late' in the
show/competition. Often young members of the bands
are chosen.
The hated and feared
play/competing position of number 'one' -
is to be avoided at all cost. It - position one -
is loaded with all sort of 'ills' from the panman's
perspective, and experience. It is affectionately,
or should I say, sarcastically known as the "sound
check" position. It is the position where the
engineer gets to play around and create sonic
madness with that poor band's performance - while
being adjudicated. And if that wasn't bad enough,
it is the position where there will be least fan
support, because they are late arriving, or they
have strategically decided to wait until there is a
cluster of "big bands" performing. Remember, the
steelband panorama is a marathon event. In New York
twelve bands or more is the norm.
While it is not impossible, it is
extremely rare that a band has won the competition
from that position. To win from that position means
that a band so impresses the judges - even through
the engineer's 'sound check' - oops, 'sound' system
- that none of the remaining bands can match this
first band in the minds of those judges. And all of
this is taking place over a five to six hour period
on a good night. It is for this reason that almost
all the bands want to play as late as possible, so
that they may be the one to have a lasting and fresh
impression on the judges.
If you are a medium-size band,
you do not really want to be playing between or
right after one of the large bands. You may lose
out to the audience and judges, because of the
difference in the weight of the sound which can have
a profound effect on the live listening audience.
And if you are a large band you do not want to be
sandwiched between too many smaller bands - you
might get forgotten in the pack.
All in all, if you are really
good technically and musically, play/competition
position should not matter - but we are dealing with
humans and in a steelband music panorama
competition, the intangibles always matter.