Panorama Re engineered:It Is Now A Hustler's Paradise.
Dennis Phillip (at right). No one had to dare him to speak publicly, for the records. It was about time. And that was evident in his tone which was strident but respectful, as is the nature of the man who was part of the team that built the structure for all the financial benefits that accrue to steelbands competing for Panorama, at least. Ironically, for the post Covid Panorama (the Jubilee year, no less) his band was starved of funds. For starters, Birdsong Steelband (Academy and Social Enterprises), born out of the University of the West Indies, has been denied access to TT$60,000, which Dennis Phillip (a founding member) says is owed from the 2022 Taste of Carnival. Indeed it was a bitter taste for the band that did not "qualify" for a place on the stage at the Queen's Park Savannah, as Pan Trinbago’s President Beverley Ramsey Moore arbitrarily ruled their exclusion on the grounds that they did not play a bomb tune. “She deemed Andre Tanker’s Forward Home as a calypso...