Music educator Ray Holman is considered a legend in the pan fraternity – and not without good reason.
The composer and arranger began making outstanding contributions to the steelpan industry as a teenager, and now, over 60 decades later, his extensive repertoire of work is being given due recognition by arts organisation Canboulay Productions, with the hosting of a steelpan musical, Pantopia.
"I feel tremendously blessed and honoured that people would consider that my work of music should be recognised and preserved in this way," Holman told Sunday Newsday in a phone interview.
"I'm looking forward to hearing the music and seeing the actors performing it."
The production will be staged at the Hadco Phase II Pan Groove panyard, Port of Spain, from April 5-7 and 12-14.
Holman said, as far as he knows, this steelpan musical is the first of its kind in Trinidad and Tobago.
The idea is the brainchild of director, playwright, lecturer and co-founder of Canboulay Productions Rawle Gibbons who wrote the script and will produce the play.
"Culturally, if not politically, the 1970s was an era of revolutionary change in the Caribbean. In TT specifically, the period saw the rise of Winston Bailey, the Mighty Shadow, overturning the Kitchener-Sparrow road-march hegemony, Black Stalin and Brother Valentino fortifying the Black Power legacy in calypso and the emergence of new forms within the music – rapso and Lord Shorty’s sokah.
"In steelband, the breakthrough year was 1972. For the first time, an original composition by a steelband arranger entered and swept its way to the finals of the Panorama competition. Pan on the Move ranks Ray Holman among the creative revolutionaries of the 1970s," Gibbons said.
[caption id="attachment_1063050" align="alignnone" width="576"] Pan educator Ray Holman, left, with Pantopia musical director Aku Leith. -[/caption]
Pan on the Move revolutionised Panorama that year – the same year Carnival was postponed from February to May because of a polio outbreak. In March 2022, the story of how the song was created and the challenges experienced by Holman in its creation was showcased in a documentary by Mark Loquan Music and Sthenic 22.
"I feel it is important to recognise his work and people like him who have given so much to improve the quality of life in our society."
Gibbons said because of the nature of Holman's work, this is something he has wanted to do for years and is glad he is finally able to see his vision come to fruition.
"He is one of our outstanding composers and his works need to be shared in other formats, not just at Panorama."
He said the honorary doctor of letters conferred upon Holman by the UWI, St Augustine in 2021 opened the conversation.
[caption id="attachment_1063045" align="alignnone" width="1024"] The cast of Pantopia rehearse for the musical. -[/caption]
"I've always believed we need to celebrate our talent while they are alive. That's what Canboulay Productions has been doing. The process of writing the script would have taken a few month
