SAN­DRA L BLOOD

Oc­to­ber 18 marks the last chance this year for pan lovers world­wide to ex­pe­ri­ence steel­pan at its finest at a Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tion. As part of Pan Trin­ba­go’s 2025 Panora­ma cal­en­dar, which runs from No­vem­ber 2024, To­ba­go will host its new­ly mint­ed Na­tion­al Panora­ma Com­pe­ti­tion, PanOmega — a re-imag­ined, re­struc­tured, and re­brand­ed ver­sion of the for­mer THA Pan Champs, tra­di­tion­al­ly held in Feb­ru­ary.

Pro­duced col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly by the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) and Pan Trin­ba­go, PanOmega in­vites every­one to “feel the rhythm; feel yuh self” at Mar­ket Square in Scar­bor­ough, with gates open­ing at 5 pm, a pre-show at 6 pm, and the main event kick­ing off at 7 pm.

The event of­fers an im­mer­sive ex­pe­ri­ence where spec­ta­tors can cheer for their favourite bands, dance, sing along, en­joy re­fresh­ments, and sup­port small busi­ness­es — in­clud­ing Pan Trin­ba­go’s spe­cial­ly brand­ed mer­chan­dise.

PanOmega earns its name as both a cul­tur­al and sym­bol­ic fi­nale. Trinidad’s Panora­ma is con­sid­ered the “al­pha” — the first Panora­ma in T&T and the world — while To­ba­go’s PanOmega rep­re­sents the “omega”, clos­ing the na­tion­al and in­ter­na­tion­al Panora­ma cal­en­dar for the year.

The pre-show at 6 pm fea­tures three sin­gle pan bands: Metro Stars, Hope Pan Groove, and Nat­ur­al Mys­tic. From 7 pm, the main com­pe­ti­tion be­gins with the small band cat­e­go­ry, where sev­en groups will vie to de­throne de­fend­ing cham­pi­ons T&TEC New East Side Di­men­sion. Com­pet­ing bands in­clude Al­pha Pan Pi­o­neers, Our Boys, C&B Crown Cor­daans, West­side Sym­pho­ny, Ply­mouth Bethes­da Steel Sen­sa­tions, First Cit­i­zens To­ba­go Pan­thers, and Up­town Fas­ci­na­tors.

In the large band cat­e­go­ry, Dix­ieland and RBC Re­demp­tion Sound Set­ters will chal­lenge reign­ing cham­pi­ons and hat-trick ti­tle hold­ers, Katzen­jam­mers Steel Or­ches­tra.

Pan Trin­ba­go To­ba­go re­gion­al chair­man Ker­ron Fletch­er praised pres­i­dent Bev­er­ley Ram­sey-Moore as a vi­sion­ary and ex­pressed grat­i­tude to THA Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine for sup­port­ing the event’s up­grade.

“This progress is sig­nif­i­cant for tourism, busi­ness, and the econ­o­my,” Fletch­er said. “One of Pan Trin­ba­go’s main goals is to spread and strength­en steel­pan ac­tiv­i­ties, in­clud­ing ed­u­ca­tion, through­out To­ba­go.” Au­gus­tine added that Panora­ma would be­come a per­ma­nent fix­ture in the To­ba­go Car­ni­val line­up. Fletch­er al­so not­ed his pride in know­ing that To­ba­go will close the na­tion and world’s Panora­ma cal­en­dar.

PanOmega takes place the day af­ter the Car­ni­val Kings and Queens com­pe­ti­tion, a sta­ple of the Blue To­ba­go Car­ni­val cal­en­dar. Eight judges, plus two al­ter­nates, will ad­ju­di­cate the bands, and prizes have been in­creased to re­flect the event’s grow­ing pres­tige.

Al­though PanOmega is the fi­nal Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tion of the year, it is the penul­ti­mate pan event on Pan Trin­ba­go’s 2024-2025 cal­en­dar. On Oc­to­ber 25, the Steel­pan & Pow­er Pa­rade will be pre­sent­ed in Scar­bor­ough. Mean­while, Panora­ma 2026 launch­es on No­vem­ber 9, 2025, with the first com­pe­ti­tion ten­ta­tive­ly sched­uled for No­vem­ber 12.

PanOmega At­ten­dance De­tails:

Tick­ets: $150

Trinidad: Pan Trin­ba­go Head Of­fice, 55 Dun­don­ald Street, POS, or call (868) 235-5493

To­ba­go: Unit 1A, TLH Build­ing, Scar­bor­ough, or call (868) 639-1402

On­line: pantrin­ba­go.co.tt