An event of historic dimension takes place in Port of Spain this week with the first-ever International Conference and Panorama.
The event is expected to draw people from steelpan-playing countries from around the world including expert pan players, tuners, arrangers, researchers, academics, policymakers and people who simply love pan. The three-day conference segment opens on Wednesday at the Hyatt with the theme “Globalisation and Development of the Steelpan”. Simultaneously, a Steelpan Village featuring live pan music and booths offering cultural goods and services will run at the Queen’s Park Savannah in Port of Spain from Wednesday evening. The grand climax occurs on Sunday afternoon with an international Steelband Panorama featuring 24 bands, half of them from Trinidad and Tobago and the other 12 from around the world.
This initiative is a significant milestone for Pan Trinbago which entrusted its planning and execution of to a high-level secretariat. The idea of an international conference on pan in the birthplace of the steelpan has been long in coming. The idea was proposed at least 14 years ago at the 2001 Science and Technology Conference and raised again at Steelfest 2012. That it is finally coming to fruition is a matter for which Pan Trinbago and the Secretariat should be commended.
Almost from its beginning in Trinidad, the steelpan has been travelling the world, invariably astonishing people as it goes. The US navy personnel who fell in love with the instrument while stationed at Chaguaramas were among the first to export the invention. In the years since, the steelpan has continued to mesmerise musicians with many making a ritual of coming to Trinidad for the Carnival experience of playing and listening to pan. Through them, pan has found its way to every continent in the world where it is on stage, in classrooms, in communities and in engineering laboratories.
To a significant extent, however, the roots of pan remain in the bosom of Trinidad even as it extends out into the world. The steelpan may therefore be unique as a global musical instrument that retains deep linkages to its place of origin. For this reason, the steelpan-playing world is a community that is literally and spiritually connected to T&T.
http://www.trinidadexpress.com/20150802/editorial/pan-on-a-high-note
Replies
Black Stalin - Respect The Steelband...
Anytime there is a forum such as this and attention is not drawn to the plight of the STEELBAND today in the Mecca we are not too smart.
TOO MUCH TIME IS BEING SPENT ON THE HISTORY AT THE EXPENSE OF THE PRESENT.
In the entire SIX DAY conference only 20 MINUTES is being devoted to the HISTORY OF THE STEELBAND (STEELPAN) and that is coupled with THE HISTORY OF PAN TRINBAGO. For the most part, the history books are written and everybody is thinking and talking about taking "THE MOVEMENT" forward.
I see a big explosion of PAN CONSCIOUSNESS (as this conference demonstrates) in the areas of PAN RESEARCH (Engineering) and PAN IN EDUCATION and PAN SOCIOLOGY and PAN DOCUMENTATION.
Not too much ROOM left for the STEELBAND.
What PAN needs more than anything else today is 49 other pan men like ROBERT GREENIDGE playing in POPULAR BANDS all over the world. That is my idea of PAN GLOBALIZATION.
Time for a restructuring of the Steel Pan Soloist Competitions...starting in the schools.
POINT well taken...
Honestly , I'm more curious about the Conference than about the so called International Panorama , which cannot help but be rigged in favor of the T&T bands by circumstances .
I'm curious to hear their views on the steelband ( not the pan ) , it's role in T&T culture and society , and their visions for it's future .
Glenroy, the truth of the matter is that they don't know what to do about the Steelband in the Mecca, they fool themselves and try to fool others by talking about the Steelpan. They allow the Steelband to be pigeon-hole into panorama now they cannot undo it.
Talking about the1000lb Gorilla in the room.
Yup! Steelband has gone to every corner of the globe and yet, it has gone NO WHERE. Big words like "Globalization" mesmerize everyone but the grassroot man. When we the people beg 'do something for pan', Is this it? Well, we wait to see when the millions start trickling down to the player.
Patrick: Rhetoric to confuffle yuh brain but when the conference done everything remain the same.
Well, like the writer said: Most exciting to the public, however, is likely to be Sunday’s International Panorama in which 12 of T&T’s top steelbands go up against bands from around the world. If all goes as planned, Pan Trinbago and all of T&T should have good reason to be proud [when TRINIDAD STEELBANDS beat the life out of some half dead GLOBALIZED PANSIDES.]
I too hope that this week conference an effective forum.