Truth, I-Blog

Professor Liam Teague (Photo  Frederic Dubray)  "I am a Dreamer," he declared.  And he’s got ideas. But, here in Trinidad,   Professor Liam   Teague   does not speak unless spoken to except when he is teaching. You would have to seek knowledge. And it is only then this humble man with an unmatched steelpan performance resume and teaching history would give some insight. Usually stoic and measured, Teague steers clear of controversy. Being in a panyard is not quite a normal experience for him anymore. The greater part of his life is now in the classrooms and the concert halls. But it has become an annual pilgrimage, a humbling one.   And while the internationally recognised steelpan virtuoso is honoured to be among the thousands of musicians and players of instruments he hungers for more people, in Trinidad, to be able to truly appreciate what we have. All year he works with students who sight read music. In the panyard, he adjusts his game to b...

A community leader redefined.... Not until he was proven to be the gift sent from Siparia to Laventille, to bring the lost and wandering band from atop the Hill back to its spiritual moorings, that eyes opened to Carlton Alexander. Brother of Clive Zanda, Carlton, the lesser-known of the two, was on the threshold of three-score and ten when he gave the iconic Desperadoes Steel Orchestra a Panorama victory that pulled them out of a 15-year slump. But it was not just a journey from   South to North Trinidad, via Canada and the USA and more lately   Soweto through his project with the late Hugh Masekela. Carlton@left with Hugh Masekela and Clive. Photo Trinidad Guardian. Clearly, he was divinely prepared to recover the voice that was muted by the hard times (not financially) on which the band had fallen   with the residue of Rudolph Charles’ leadership legacy in the dust. Desperadoes also lost its legendary arrangers, Beverley Griffith and Clive Bradley. When ...