All this clamour and resentment because a FOREIGNER decides to come to Trinidad and arrange a PANORAMA song is pure irony to me. I am sure that 80% of the people screaming "WE TING WE TING" are not even REAL TRINIDADIANS. Three quarters of the self-appointed guardians of the culture their mothers and fathers (and in many cases themselves) came to Trinidad ILLEGALLY from Barbados and St. Vincent and Grenada and whatever other small islands. And now they are pretending to be more Trinidadian than crab and callaloo.
This reminds me of a story told to me by Patrick Arnold, the previous president of PAN TRINBAGO. Patrick Arnold born and grow up in Tobago and then he came to Trinidad and got involved in the PAN TING in Port-of-Spain. So is always some kinda fatigue about being from Tobago, day in day out among the pan men about him NOT BEING FROM TRINIDAD and BEING FROM TOBAGO. Finally, some country invited a STEELBAND FROM TRINIDAD to come play in their FOREIGN LAND and the Government started to tell the PAN MEN to bring their passports so that they could get their VISA. Patrick say he was shock to find out that as much as he was from Tobago -- he had a Trinidad passport and almost nobody else could produce a Trinidad passport because most ah dem fellahs was from Grenada and St. Vincent and Barbados and wherever else. That was the end of all the heckling about being from Tobago.
These are the same people and their children screaming bloody murder today because some foreigner come to Trinidad to arrange a few songs in WE PANORAMA TING. That is real hypocrisy.
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No big deal, Patrick, Not really.
So that is why I ask: why when we say that we do not accept it,why do people jump at us , call us racist, anti-white, xenophobic, anti-american? And even suggest that if a black arranger had said it we would not have disagreed?
THAT'S the big deal, isn't it?
Someone suggests that Panorama should change an intrinsic element, In the name of 'growing' pan generally. We say NO! because we think it is important that that element stays.
People jump on us.
We argue that only a foreigner could lead this push for such a change, (Now of course there are some who, through emotionalism, fear of the foreigner who might want to 'tief we ting, or insecurity or racial angst, jumped in and made some silly points, but to claim that this describes everyone who has made the objection, is dishonest)
I think that the fact that none of your 'black arrangers' have made the argument, is instructive. Could it not be that, although they themselves continue to push the envelope and experiment, they see the wisdom in keeping that essential criterion. Its a visceral thing.
Don't go there Claude.
I have been fascinated by your discussion points on so many occasions that I have to express my disappointment with this one -- that is, if I am reading you correctly.
First of all, Fellers whose parents came from Grenada in those days, or who never got a passport (even if they were born here) giving fatigue to a man who come from Tobago is one thing. Remember, inter island migration was common in the old days -- especially after the first oil boom after the war. But a man coming from the US in the 21st century and arguing for a change in panorama is another thing altogether.
Secondly, I agree that steelband music, as an art form, needs to continue to develop and change and grow. I think everybody agrees with that.. But Panorama is not the artform, panorama is a specific competition, in which an aspect of the artform, albeit an important one, is featured.
And change is not new to Panorama. Change is great, especially when the artists involved push the envelope, 'try tings' to see what they can get the steelband, as a musical expression, to do. What is significant is that these changes took place within the specific demands of the competition. Despers, Ellie Mannette, and others, experimented with the instruments themselves, introducing new instruments to the types of pans we heard. Where arrangements were concerned, we also witnessed the movement from 'intro to tune to fancy arrangement to conclusion' to far more complex approaches. Then there were the things like the introduction of the use of chromatic runs (which Narell maligned) in order to build the excitement in a tune. Even experiments in the underlying rhythm with 'Curry Tabanca' and the tassa drums, to Holman's 'The Wedding' in 2014, which included the use of Indian tonal qualities and harmonies. etc, etc, etc.
So experimentation continued/continues and the product grows.
But there is one constant.
In a panorama tune the 'spirit of carnival' MUST be there. Most associate this with the tempo at which a tune is played. But I am convinced that it is more than this . In every great panorama tune, there is a moment when the band as a whole 'ketch de power' and the arrangement, the pans, the panmen, and the audience/revellers all seem to become caught up in the rhythm, the melody, the 'vibe' of the piece.. (Interestingly, Narell speaks about this when he is expounding on pan).
Nutones 'High Mas' (posted in this discussion), is a classic example of a tune, played at a tempo a little slower than most,but which captures this vibe. In the piece, the panmen are carried away by their music (watch them -- smile at the bassman at 3:30 -3:40! The crowd gets involved and enraptured and all are swept along. Nutones, through the brilliance of the arrangement and the internalization of it by the panmen and women, 'ketch de power' musically. Even me, in mi ole age, feel to get up an prance when I hearin it.
The spirit of Carnival! Yeah!
Narell is saying that dat ehn important!
He must be mad!
And dat is why people vex. He cyan ketch dat power deh. So he want it to count for nothin.
What happen to he?.
An dat is why we sayin he arrogant. Can a Trini, a Grenadian or a Jamaican go to a bluegrass festival and after some years of participation and being judged as mediocre, demand that they change what they consider the essence of bluegrass?
Dey might lynch he tail! But we are far more tolerant. A bit too much so, some claim
But I disagree with them. he should be encouraged, but told to tek he licks like a man!
Didn't this discussion start with a complaint about "Andy's arrogance', because he said that only 1 % of the possibilities of pan had been used so far?.
I did not see that as a dismissal of the of 'those who have gone before 'and their great achievements. At all. Rather I understood it to be a statement of wide eyed wonder at the infinite, future possibilities of this wonderful instrument and the people who play it.
Am I alone in thinking so?
You are not alone, Lilian!!!! It was a compliment to the instrument that was COMPLETELY MISCONSTRUED. I left it alone at the time. But I was greatly surprised by the FAILURE to see what he was saying when it seemed so OBVIOUS.
The TRINIS have sharpened swords when it comes to Andy so their first response to anything he says is to SLASH AT HIM.
Claude, it was not the 1% statement that caused the fallout. it was the claim that panorama needs to change. At least this was it for most of us.
I who have purchased a lot of his music, was annoyed by this.
But I don't buy the 'wide eyed wonder' argument' Any lover of an instrument, researches it. . He is an educated, intelligent man, who uses words well. So he should understand the implications of his 1% statement. To most people, it seemed to be devised in order to place Narell at the 'infancy' of the instrument.
So Ellie and dem fellas contributed to the 1%. Time for Narell and co to start discovering the other 99!
Maybe I, like so many others have become wary because we have seen so much that belongs to third world peoples --especially cultural artifacts become referred to as 'owing so much to' a first world entity.
Picasso is the 'father' of cubism, isn't he? Hah!
Jobim is the father of Brazillean music, too, not true? Hah!
Noel. You have a point re being"placed at the infancy of the instrument ' as a strategic career statement. I agree.
Not sure where you are going with Picasso and cubism, but Picasso was well known for his 'appropriations', he had a 'if you fart -he tief it ' reputation among his fellow artists, one of whom was the lesser known, but far more accomplished, Cuban artist Wilfredo Lamm.
"Cubism" was a derogatory name invented by a critic. No artist worth his salt has ever invented an '-ism', that is done by academics, who are in the business of ordering , cataloguing and analyzing creative chaos, much like the Panorama judges having to fit the fullness of 'music of the spheres' into the narrow confines of artificially constructed categories. It is what it is, but the result is GOOD MUSIC. For which I, and many with me, are humbly grateful-to those who have gone before and those who continue in the love.
Having said that: there is, in the entire Caribbean, a lack of written and published records of the music and the arts. Much of whole vibrant generation has just passed to the other side - and there is little to remember them by- scattered newspaper articles , a few programs, some dissertations in University libraries, a couple of books- but not enough to describe what transpired in T&T in the latter half of the 20th century. WST is a great forum for discussion and information, both historical and contemporary, it could also be an essential platform for research and publication.
By the way-Andy Narell is Jewish- does that make his critics Anti-Semitic?
Oh gorm….lol...
Ouch! That hurts “the Panorama judges having to fit the fullness of ‘music of the spheres into the narrow confines of artificially constructed categories.” Good Music not being able to achieve its fullest potential...
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