News
Jensen La Vende
File photo/Angelo Marcell
TO match the “mother of all Carnivals,” Pan Trinbago president Beverly Ramsey-Moore said Panorama 2023 can be a grand affair as it’ll be the diamond jubilee.
Talking to Newsday on Sunday night on the launch of Panorama 2023 at Massy Trinidad All Stars panyard on Duke Street, Port of Spain, Ramsey-Moore said the primary Panorama in two years can be a jubilation that can be marked with “style and sophistication.”
The theme for next yr can be “Nothing sweeter than pan.”
“In 2020, we somewhat re-engineered the Panorama, in that the medium bands final was held in Tobago. We carried a national event on a big scale for the very first time in Tobago, and we’re going back to Tobago in 2023 with the medium bands final.
“The big bands, after all, can be one other standalone but what we’re going to be doing for 2023, as an alternative of ten bands going into the finals, we’re going to carry in 12 bands. In order that is absolutely, really a giant one.
“One other thing is that the North Stand can be back!”
On the launch of Carnival 2023 the day past, Tourism, Culture and the Arts Minister Randall Mitchell said coming out of this yr’s Taste of Carnival, next yr can be a grand affair, dubbing it the mother of all Carnivals.
Ramsey-Moore said the North Stand has nostalgic powers that may help to fan the uniting power of pan come next yr and hopes corporate TT will partner with Pan Trinbago. Together with the North Stand comes the return of the Greens, which for a few years pan lovers despised, because the fete-like atmosphere took away from the pan. Ramsey-Moore said it will change in 2023.
“I’m telling you straight out that I do not like the Greens. As a bandleader I actually felt that it was distracting, and I might normally tell my band, don’t strike a note until they’re quiet. I could do without that distraction.
“But at the identical time, as we move forward, we’d like to search out other avenues, so even the individuals who really don’t like Panorama but just need to be on this space, we now have to search out a solution to include them. Also, we now have to be certain that we now have sound management to regulate the posse when the bands are on stage.”
Ramsey-Moore said Panorama will kick off on Friday with the one pan preliminaries, with the finals in early December. In January the small bands finals can be held before moving on to the medium and enormous bands.
She said while the 2023 Panorama can be the diamond jubilee, the prize money for the competition, for her, lacks the regal status befitting such an occasion. She said she wished the $2 million first prize for giant bands could return .
“We speak of a mother of all Carnivals; we wouldn’t have the mother of all Carnival money.
“But for us, it will be the performances, the execution of the music and all of that. Our bands are committed because we are saying that pan is community soul. Pan is Trinidad and Tobago, and we’re prepared to offer the group and provides the audience a special show, a dynamic show, one which they’ll always remember.”
Asked about the potential of increasing the prize money for next yr, Mitchell, who was on the launch, said that was as much as the National Carnival Commission (NCC), which he said is well resourced for a full Carnival.
Asked about plans to make pan the national instrument with legal backing, Mitchell said: “We’ve got drafted something and now’s to take it to the Ministry of the Attorney General for his or her eyes. Then there are some consultations, then we’ll bring it to Parliament.
“It’s going to be great to bring that to Parliament for the diamond jubilee. I can’t tell what the parliamentary agenda is. It is a straightforward piece of laws simply declaring pan a national instrument of TT. We’ve got done the research: we now have seen where other states and countries have declared musical instruments their national or state musical instruments, and we now have adopted a draft piece of laws, we now have developed a policy, and we’ll see where it goes.”
On Sunday, while the dignitaries remained within the VIP area, the group outside thoroughly enjoyed pan from the likes of Uptown Fascinators, NGC Couva Joylanders, BP Renegades, Massy Trinidad All Stars and the Prison Service Band.
Those that didn’t record their performances livestreamed them. One woman, Cheryl West-James, had her two sisters – Jennifer Thomas in Canada, Marilyn West in Atlanta – and her two daughters, Lashanna James and Michelle West, on a WhatsApp video call. The ladies were supporting her son Stephon West, arranger for the Joylanders.
Some pople stood still as they looked on. The rhythmic pounding of the pan evoked the gyrating of waists for others, jumping off the concrete ground for just a few and the two-step chip in some. Drinks and phones were seen in hands, and only a few people wore masks.
Raymond and Denise Straker said they left Tobago to come back to the launch of Panorama and can return on Tuesday. Raymond is an All Starts supporter having grown up in Mango Rose, East Dry River, while his wife, who grew up in Woodbrook, is a Starlift supporter.
They said their love for pan brought them to All Stars’ panyard, together with the young, young at heart and not-so-young who couldn’t hide their jubilation over the country’s national instrument, whether or not it’s supported with laws.
