Tony Fras­er

A road­way has been opened for the re-en­try of the steel­band in­to Car­ni­val; how­ev­er, if it is to be trans­formed in­to a su­per­high­way with feed­er roads lead­ing in many di­rec­tions, Pan Trin­ba­go, the steel­bands and the Min­istry of Health, which opened up the pos­si­bil­i­ties with its spon­sor­ship of a Car­ni­val Mon­day night of pan, must co-op­er­ate and be an or­gan­ic part of the evolv­ing dy­nam­ics of the Car­ni­val.

Con­tem­plate for a mo­ment the po­ten­tial of 33 steel­bands play­ing their way along Ari­api­ta Av­enue while thou­sands of those with the sound of pan writ­ten in­to their DNA and oth­ers drawn to the live steel­band mu­sic swayed in one place or chip en­tranced and com­pelled by the sound of our mu­si­cal gift to the world.

There was no ver­bal con­tention, no bot­tle-pelt­ing, no coarse lan­guage and be­hav­iours, no three-quar­ter-naked win­er-girls and men vul­gar­is­ing the space, while those who in­trud­ed with their mon­ster elec­tron­ic box­es were asked nice­ly to move on.To get a feel for the vibe, think of the melody and lyrics of Shad­ow's Din­go­lay: (Steel­band) "Mu­sic fills the world with hap­pi­ness and to­geth­er­ness, mu­sic has no friend or en­e­my, every­body could din­go­lay... din­go­lay... if yuh shoes buss up, old la­dy, young ba­by, every­body... mu­sic sweet."

http://www.guardian.co.tt/dig­i­tal/new-mem­bers