NARIS­SA FRAS­ER

Jer­mal “Jer­nol” Cal­len­der is thrilled af­ter his song Prob­lem Mak­ers helped a steel­band earn the 2026 UK Na­tion­al Panora­ma Small Band ti­tle.

The so­ca track was co-writ­ten by Cal­len­der, Shum­ba Mahluli and pro­duced by Ju­maane Mc Neil and Stephon Gabriel. It speaks of ex­pe­ri­enc­ing “fight down,” from those least ex­pect­ed, in­clud­ing fam­i­ly mem­bers.

He sings, “Grand­pa al­ways told me it’s bet­ter to dead and leave than to live and war.” He ques­tions why those clos­est to you would ever try to blame and shame you and nev­er take ac­count­abil­i­ty.

He con­tin­ues, “I putting ah end to this. (It) have no progress in it… But I call­ing yuh out.” He then gives a shout-out to “no-good, bad­mind” prob­lem mak­ers, telling them to stop be­ing trai­tors.

The 31-year-old, who hails from Gas­par­il­lo, told WE Life and Cul­ture he grew up sur­round­ed by the na­tion­al in­stru­ment. His cousins run the South­ern Marines Steel­band Foun­da­tion Or­ches­tra in Mara­bel­la. “So I ba­si­cal­ly grew up in the pa­n­yard,” he said with a chuck­le.

He moved to the US at age 18, but the love for mu­sic re­mained. So he be­gan to sing and write songs, re­main­ing in the realm of so­ca. But 2025 would bring one of his best re­leas­es yet.

He re­called UK steel­band New Gen­er­a­tion Or­ches­tra con­tact­ing him ear­li­er this year on In­sta­gram, say­ing they want­ed to use his 2025 song, Prob­lem Mak­ers, for the UK Panora­ma com­pe­ti­tion as part of Not­ting Hill Car­ni­val cel­e­bra­tions. Elat­ed, he im­me­di­ate­ly said yes.

“I felt re­al­ly en­light­ened, es­pe­cial­ly as I have a deep pas­sion and love for the cul­ture,” he said. “And you re­al­ly want peo­ple to hear your mu­sic and ex­pe­ri­ence what you did and felt when you were writ­ing and singing it.”

He said the band loved both the mes­sage and pro­duc­tion of the song and heaped praise on it. They al­so kept in touch as they re­hearsed ahead of the com­pe­ti­tion.

The fi­nal was held on Au­gust 2 and the band tied for first place with Pan Na­tion Steel Or­ches­tra, both earn­ing 331 points.

Asked how he felt watch­ing the per­for­mance, Cal­len­der said it was an emo­tion­al mo­ment, and he was filled with grat­i­tude. He added that the arrange­ment was done by 16-year-old Lushan Den­nis.

“The song talks about the bat­tles and is­sues that peo­ple may find with the peo­ple around them (and) it in­cludes things that I’ve seen hap­pen, things I’ve been told and some things I ex­pe­ri­enced my­self, and I think that’s what res­onates with so many peo­ple.”

In an In­sta­gram post an­nounc­ing the win, he said the song was “grow­ing like a flower.” “To­day, it bloomed in a way I could on­ly pray for.”

He con­grat­u­lat­ed the band, adding, “Thank you to every­one who be­lieved in this project and helped bring it to life. Every step, every con­tri­bu­tion and every sac­ri­fice mat­ters.”

And while it’s a great mile­stone, he said he’s not stop­ping there.

He con­tin­ues to re­ceive pos­i­tive feed­back from mem­bers of the pub­lic, as well as words of en­cour­age­ment to keep push­ing in the mu­sic in­dus­try.

Jok­ing that some peo­ple call him “Juke­box’ be­cause he’s al­ways singing, he said he tru­ly wants to con­tin­ue to con­tribute to T&T’s cul­ture. “Mu­sic, to me, is a form of ex­pres­sion and es­cape. Sit­ting with my emo­tions to write songs is where the mag­ic hap­pens, and I al­ways try to cre­ate some­thing au­then­tic.”

Prob­lem Mak­ers is avail­able on all mu­sic stream­ing plat­forms, as well as his oth­er re­cent re­lease ti­tled Save The Talk.