There is new excitement at the Highlanders Pan Theatre and Learning Centre. Launched earlier this year, the Highlanders Youth Steel Orchestra has brought “a positive alternative for our young people” and the Success Village, Laventille community says manager Robert Hernandez.
Already 25 young people have joined the band, whose membership is open to anyone under 21. The Youth Orchestra’s manager is Kaila Jones Baptiste, and Joeth Roberts and Shaquille Gaskin arrange and teach music.
Highlanders Pan Theatre, which opened in December 2023, is seen as a safe place for youths where they will learn discipline, teamwork, and good values and to play pan. “Many parents and their friends come to hear the band rehearse,” says Hernandez. “The entire community has been very supportive.”
The band is also closely connected to schools in the area. Once chairman of the Success/ Laventille Secondary School board, Hernandez believes institutions can sow cohesion in a community. “We are encouraging the schools to use our pan yard and we hope to attract student players,” says Hernandez. “We schedule rehearsal so that it doesn’t interfere with their school hours. One band member is a teacher in the Movant/Laventille Secondary School.
There is a strategic side to all of this. Highlanders now has 45 players who competed in the National Panorama (small band category) for the first time in decades. Highlanders last made it to Panorama Finals in 1968. Now they want to go straight to the large band category. That means they have to increase the band size, hence the Youth Orchestra has to play a key role. Highlanders plans to cultivate new members through the Youth Orchestra, which uses the senior band’s pans.
The band’s Panorama sponsorship support comes from the Laventille-based Angostura and seasonal help from National Petroleum and the National Lotteries Control Board. “They all support us and are very reliable,” says Hernandez, “Still, we want to partner with a permanent sponsor who can share with our brand.”
That brand now has its first permanent home with a 99-year lease from NP. It is also a registered not-for-profit corporation with the Ministry of Legal Affairs. That’s a long way from Highlanders’ early glory days when the band was based in Bertie Marshall’s yard. After his house burned down they kotched wherever they could.
The ground floor of the new headquarters has a covered practice area, a cafeteria, a bar, and proper bathrooms. There is also an executive office, a boardroom/conference room, and a gift shop that stocks band jerseys, pan sticks, music CDs, miniature and real-size steel pans. The Pan Theatre is fully wi-fi equipped and has three classrooms for training on the first floor. Highlanders collaborates with an East Port of Spain development company for some of the training. The band is also hiring consultants to train its young people in etiquette and spoken word skills. Musical Director of the National Steel Symphony Orchestra Kareem Brown is also Highlanders’ Music Director and arranges for the band. He will be teaching band members music theory.
The community makes good use of the Pan Theatre. A group from the New Butler Associate College recently rehearsed there for the Best Village competition, and the Unistars Steel Orchestra, a single-pan group, is preparing for the national steel pan festival in the space. The Laventille Boys Government Primary school recently held its Graduation and Awards Ceremony at the Pan Theatre. “We intend to become one of the stops for tourist ship visitors and we are working with the Ministry of Tourism to accomplish that,” says Hernandez. As Highlanders Pan Theatre takes its rightful place in the pan community we can expect no less.