Wes­ley Gib­bings

arang on the grounds of the St Michael’s RC Church in Mara­cas Val­ley is an un­miss­able an­nu­al event for hard­core fol­low­ers of the sea­son­al genre, gen­er­al mu­sic lovers, and those in­ter­est­ed in one of the more aes­thet­i­cal­ly out­stand­ing parang venues in the coun­try.

This year’s edi­tion, on No­vem­ber 29, marked the fi­nal stop for events or­gan­ised by the Na­tion­al Parang As­so­ci­a­tion this sea­son. It did not, how­ev­er, mean the end of parang mu­sic for the year as such sea­son­al fare re­mains a fea­ture of both sched­uled and spon­ta­neous per­for­mances through­out the coun­try.

En­ti­tled El Poder de la Par­ran­da (the pow­er of parang) the St Michael’s show was de­signed “to high­light the strength and tal­ent of the par­ran­deros who con­tin­ue in the tra­di­tion of the stal­warts,” the as­so­ci­a­tion said.

“In ad­di­tion, this year’s theme al­so looked at the pow­er of the art­form in the way it shared the good news to its lis­ten­ers,” the as­so­ci­a­tion added.

The com­bi­na­tion of youth and se­nior bands brought a spe­cial in­ter-gen­er­a­tional touch to the pro­ceed­ings, as if to sup­port the theme of con­tin­ued pow­er. At the re­cent Ju­nior Parang Fes­ti­val, Sa­cred Heart Girls of Port-of-Spain came away with sec­ond place ho­n­ours, and they con­firmed their high stand­ing at St Michael’s.

So too did joint Sec­ondary Schools win­ners—St Joseph’s Con­vent, St Joseph and Bish­op Anstey/QRC com­bined.

Oth­er youth bands at the show in­clud­ed Amantes de Par­ran­da Jr, and Ar­mo­nia Mag­nifi­cas Jr.

MC, Gerelle Forbes, kept things rolling en­er­get­i­cal­ly and smooth­ly.

With a Peo­ple’s Choice award up for grabs, top se­nior bands in­clud­ing Vo­ces de Prome­sa, Amantes de Par­ran­da, Los Ami­gos Can­ta­dores, Ar­mo­nias Mag­nifi­cas, Vi­va Je­sus, and Los Buenos Par­ran­deros took the stage, as pa­trons in­creas­ing­ly oc­cu­pied live­ly dance spaces.

In the au­di­ence was Op­po­si­tion Leader Pen­ne­lope Beck­les, ev­i­dent­ly re­laxed in the midst of a hec­tic po­lit­i­cal sched­ule.

Los Buenos Par­ran­deros emerged as the crowd favourite. Fol­low­ing the win, the band took to so­cial me­dia to apol­o­gise “for the non-stop rhythm, the cu­a­tro strum­ming, the box pulling, the har­monies bussing, and the pure Christ­mas joy flood­ing your (so­cial me­dia feed.”

Parang As­so­ci­a­tion Pres­i­dent, Ali­cia Jag­gasar de­scribed the process as “com­mu­ni­ty-dri­ven judg­ing.”

This, she added, meant that bands were “judged by votes from the au­di­ence, en­cour­ag­ing each band to bring fam­i­ly, friends, and sup­port­ers, while build­ing com­mu­ni­ty en­gage­ment.”

When the vot­ing box­es were opened and count­ed at the end of the event, Buenos Par­ran­deros were cel­e­brat­ed as the Peo­ple’s Choice at Mara­cas Val­ley. St Michael’s mean­while won, yet again, as a pre­mier parang venue.