Pan’s Global Ambition Hits Pause: Export Flagship In Choppy Waters
As the news went viral and the ripple of shock rose to a crescendo of outrage, embarrassment and recrimination, Michael Cooper sent out a WhatsApp message: “Well… well……
Controversial Pan Patent Lapses
The US steelpan patent that rocked Trinidad and Tobago 20 years ago has lapsed on “fee-related” grounds and the patent is now listed for official expiration on June…
Steelband Sponsorship: Security Vs Dependency
Sponsorship’s double-edged sword cut deeply when 15 steelbands abruptly lost their sponsorship and grants following the closure of state-owned Petrotrin. The impact of the sudden loss of a…
In Numbers: Curepe Scherzando’s Budget Crunch
With its last cent already spent even before the judges arrive, Curepe Scherzando is down to figuring out where to find the next $5,000 to pay for T-shirts…
Pan In A Vice
With a mere 15 percent of the 147 bands registered for Panorama 2019 having the financial support of a title sponsor, guava season economic conditions are hitting the…
Portrait Of An Unsung Singer
Munilal Sagar Sookraj was a veritable storehouse of knowledge on East Indian music in Trinidad and the Caribbean. He was a singer, percussionist and composer of Indian folk…
Negotiating Pan’s Labyrinth
It might have been said that there he was only protecting his own. From the first he had been admitted to live in the intimacy of the family…
When Chutney Goes Bollywood
Rasika gestured towards the page in her hand. “Seven verses! You mad? You think people here going to stop and listen to all that? Here you does sing…
Dom Basil Matthews: God’s Pedagogue
By Winthrop R. Holder “The country … seems to be trapped in a state of in-betweenity.” —(DBM) Finding, the almost-hidden, “Dom Basil Matthews: Nihil Omnino Christo” in the back…
Agirlnameking, Remedy For Illness
Diana King is a dreamer, a quintessential singer-songwriter who has immense willpower and boundless belief in the ability to achieve whatever you dream.…
Defining The Pan Song
Panorama, Trinidad and Tobago's national steelband competition, has been a key avenue through which the art of arranging for steelbands, which requires a very specific skill set, has…
All Trumps
It is fair to say that every single patron at the Eight of Hearts Concert on May 8, 2010 would have heard about the game of All Fours,…
Guyana’s Professor Of Pan
You wouldn’t guess that Roy Geddes is seventy. Clad in his trademark Kangol and jeans Guyana’s celebrated Professor of Pan looks a full ten years younger.…
Of Magic And Music
Monday 23rd November 2009, was a night for nobility on the St Augustine Campus of the University of the West Indies.…
Birdsong Fills The Air
And so it was. The Homecoming. From Daaga Hall to Daaga Auditorium. Almost 36 years later, to date, birdsong returned to the UWI St Augustine campus, in the…