Shal­iza Has­sanali

The Co­dring­ton Pan Fam­i­ly has won The First Cit­i­zens In­ter­na­tion­al Steel­pan Jazz Chal­lenge, tak­ing home the first prize of $50,000. The oth­er six fi­nal­ists-Star­lift, Cou­va Joy­lan­ders, Courts Sound Spe­cial­ists of Laven­tille, Re­demp­tion Sound Set­ters, Rene­gades, and Ex­o­dus-each re­ceived $20,000. Held at Queen's Hall, St Ann's, on Fri­day, the Co­dring­ton Pan Fam­i­ly edged out for­mer Panora­ma champs Ex­o­dus and Rene­gades, who placed third and sec­ond, re­spec­tive­ly, in the fi­nals. At the Oc­to­ber 16 pre­lim­i­nar­ies, Ex­o­dus placed first, the Co­dring­ton Pan Fam­i­ly cap­tured sec­ond place, while Rene­gades trailed in third.

Play­ing Austin Lyons' Ethel and An­dre Tanker's For­ward Home, arranged by Keisha and Khari Co­dring­ton, the eight-mem­ber band got a stand­ing ova­tion from the small crowd for play­ing a va­ri­ety of con­ven­tion­al in­stru­ments. The Co­dring­ton Pan Fam­i­ly demon­strat­ed ex­cel­lence with their char­ac­ter­is­tic mode of ex­pres­sion in mu­sic, which gave them the ad­van­tage over their ri­vals. Their per­for­mance earned them cheers, whis­tles and sev­er­al rounds of ap­plause from pa­trons, among them for­mer Tu­na­puna MP Ed­die Hart and Port-of-Spain May­or Louis Lee Sing. The aim of the chal­lenge was to deep­en the re­la­tion­ship be­tween T&T's Steel­pan and Jazz Fes­ti­val and the steel­pan com­mu­ni­ty, as well as fur­ther pro­mote the in­te­gra­tion of the steel­pan with con­ven­tion­al mu­sic in­stru­ments util­is­ing the jazz id­iom.