Pan Trin­ba­go Inc will be­gin the 2016 Na­tion­al Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tion this evening with com­pe­ti­tion for Sin­gle Pan bands of the North­ern Re­gion tak­ing place at The Pad­dock, Queen's Park Sa­van­nah, Port-of-Spain, from 6 pm. Twen­ty-nine steel­bands are reg­is­tered for the com­pe­ti­tion.

First out of the start­ing block is "new kid on the block" New­town Play­boys Steel Sym­pho­ny with its ren­di­tion of Ron­nie McIn­tosh's On The Road, arranged by Seion Gomez.

Com­peti­tors in the main have cho­sen se­lec­tions from the 90s such as Car­ni­val Ba­by (Kitch­en­er); Doh Rock It So (Wins­ford Devine); Don't Stop This Par­ty (Swal­low); Re­bec­ca (Blue Boy); The Will (Scrunter); John­ny (Colleen El­la); The Par­ty Hot, Hot (Iw­er George); Ra Ti Ray (Mer­chant); Mar­i­lyn � Ash Wednes­day Jail (Chalk­dust); and, Par­ty Time (Bal­ly).

Tick­ets are priced at $60. The ac­tion shifts to south of the bor­der to­mor­row when ten Sin­gle Pan bands will face the pan­el of ad­ju­di­ca­tions when the South Cen­tral Re­gion stages its pre­lim­i­nary com­pe­ti­tion at Skin­ner Park, San Fer­nan­do, from 8 pm. Ad­mis­sion is al­so $60.

First on stage is Tiger Tanks Fyz­abad 4th Di­men­sion, led by Joseph Find­ley, and, for the com­pe­ti­tion the band has elect­ed to play the Su­perBlue com­po­si­tion, Get Some­thing And Wave. New Age Trend­set­ters of Ch­agua­nas will play in the fi­nal po­si­tion with an­oth­er Su­perBlue se­lec­tion, Wine on Some­thing.

In ad­di­tion to Su­perBlue, oth­er favourites in­clude works from the reper­toire of Tam­bu with two plays, fol­lowed by Kitch­en­er, Farmer Nap­py, Swal­low, Shad­ow, Machel Mon­tano (2016) and Iw­er (2016), with one each.Ex­cite­ment and ex­cel­lence can be ex­pect­ed on Sun­day when the East­ern Re­gion stages its pre­lim­i­nary at the Velo­drome, Ari­ma, from 5 pm.

Twen­ty-one bands will per­form be­fore the judges' pan­el in a bid to se­cure places in the se­mi-fi­nal round which will be held in front Pan Trin­ba­go Head Of­fice, op­po­site Vic­to­ria Square, Park Street, Port-of-Spain, on Jan­u­ary 22, in what is ex­pect­ed to be fierce com­pe­ti­tion which starts at 7 pm. The event is free to the pub­lic.

Steel­bands' se­lec­tions range from tra­di­tion­al ca­lyp­so, so­ca, oldies and goldies, pow­er and groovy so­ca with com­po­si­tions penned by Wins­ford Devine with the most plays, close­ly fol­lowed by Austin Lyons, aka Su­perBlue. Caribbean artistes in Big­gie Irie and Beck­et al­so have songs in the mix.De­fend­ing cham­pi­on San Juan East Side Sym­pho­ny will play in po­si­tion 13 and will once again be un­der the ba­ton of mae­stro Du­vonne Stew­art with his arrange­ment of Tam­bu's No No We Eh Go­ing Home.

PRE­LIM­I­NAR­IES

North­ern Re­gion Na­tion­al Panora­ma pre­lim­i­nary–Sin­gle Pan

1. New Town Play­boys Sym­pho­ny–On De Road (Seion Gomez)

2. La Famille Unit­ed–Ra Ti Ray

(Carl­ton "Zan­da" Alexan­der)

3. La Cre­ole Pan Groove–We Can Make It If We Try (Yohan Pop­well)

4. Nut­tin Big Pan Groove–Par­ty Tim

(Ja­mal Gibbs)

5. D'Un­touch­ables Pan Groove–My House

(Michael Jag­ger­nauth)

6. Nos­trand Sym­pho­ny–Pop Ah Bot­tle

(Clive Tele­maque)

7. Bel­mont Hi Larks–Drunk & Dis­or­der­ly

(Bri­an "Bean" Grif­fith)

8. Wood­brook Play­boyz–Free Up

(Michelle Hug­gins-Watts)

9. City Sun Val­ley–Commess

(Dane Gul­ston)

10.Gon­za­les Sheik­ers–Like A Boss

(Keisha Co­dring­ton)

11. Mu­sic Mak­ers–Doh Rock It

(Rik­ki Rob­ley)

12. T&T Fire Ser­vices–Re­bec­ca

(Ter­rence "BJ" Mar­celle)

13. Ice Wa­ter Pan En­sem­ble–Car­ni­val Ba­by

(Er­ic Al­lis­ter)

14. Uni Stars–The Jam­mer

(Ka­reem Brown)

15. St. James Tripo­lians–Pan Round De Neck

(Nigel Di­az)

16. Nay­al Hill S.O.M.–Too Sweet

(Hanif Goodridge)

17. Trinidad Free­lancers –Mar­i­lyn-Ash Wednes­day Jail (Com­mit­tee)

18. Sea Lots One Love–Drunk & Dis­or­der­ly

(Ian Baird)

19. Word Wide

20. All Aces–Doh Back Back (Cur­tis Ed­wards)

21. Blan­ca 47

22. Spree Si­mon Har­mon­ics–Bar­bara (Cilon Franklyn)

23. Harlem Syn­co­pa­tors–The Will (Kevin Williams)

24. Scrun­ters Pan Groove–John­ny

(Alex­is "Lecky" Hope)

25. TnT De­fence Force DS/Or­ches­tra–Don't Stop This Par­ty (Shel­don Pe­ters)

26. Star­dust–Nah do Dat (Ja­son "Peanuts" Isaac)

27. Bel­mont City Kids

28. D'Orig­i­nal W/brook Mod­er­naires–In The Road (Ankoina "Bob­by" Paul)

29. Brim­blers–The Par­ty Hot Hot

(Tevin "Sparky" Shock­ness)