Ambassadors band aim high

The Ambassadors Steelband from the Canaan/Bon Accord community is one of the many Tobago pan sides preparing for the 2015 steelband competitions.

The relatively young steelband will be attempting to bring back the steelband glory to the Tobago West community, which the once popular Starlift Steelband brought to the Canaan/Bon Accord area during the 1960s.

Ambassadors is a very youthful steelband which has done reasonably well in ‘on the road’ carnival days competition. However, according to one of the band’s inspirational members, the “next Panorama competition, we will be endeavouring to make our mark in the competition”.

Ambassadors have chosen Soca Monarch champion, Machel Montano’s 2013 smash hit ‘Mr Fete’ as their 2015 Panorama selection. The band is also seeking to impact on all of the carnival days ‘on the road’ competitions.

Meanwhile, the steelband organisation, Pan Trinbago will begin their national Panorama competitions in Tobago on Monday, Jan. 19, 7 p.m. at the Buccoo Integrated Facility. This will see the preliminary round for the Single Pan steel bands.

The steelband competitions in Tobago will continue on Monday, Jan. 26, 7:00 p.m. with the preliminaries for the small and medium steelbands at a venue to be announced. Then, on Tuesday, Jan. 27, 7:00 p.m., the national steelband judges will judge the Tobago large bands at their respective panyards. In 2014, only one Tobago steelband, RBC Redemption Soundsetters participated in the Large Band category.

Meanwhile, the Tobago House of Assembly sponsored Tobago Pan Champs competition has been scheduled for Tuesday, Feb. 16, 7:00 p.m. at a venue to be announced. On Carnival Monday, the Tobago steelbands have three ‘on the road’ competitions.

These competitions are the Early Bird Jam, the Josey Richarson Bomb Competition and the Best Beating Band contest.

On Carnival Tuesday, there will be five road competitions which are, Best Beating Steelband, Tobago Calypso Contest, Best Groovy Soca, Last Lap Jam.