Wes­ley Gib­bings

When Re­pub­lic Bank Ex­o­dus took to the stage at ex­act­ly 10 o’ clock Sat­ur­day evening, it took them ex­act­ly sev­en min­utes and forty-five sec­onds, by the judges’ clock, to es­tab­lish its cre­den­tials as this year’s win­ning Large Con­ven­tion­al Band.

Be­fore a packed Queen’s Park Sa­van­nah Grand Stand and a near ca­pac­i­ty North Stand, the Tu­na­puna based or­ches­tra de­liv­ered what arranger Ter­rence “BJ” Mar­celle de­scribed to T&T Guardian as a mu­si­cal “pack­age of love.”

He said that in as­sem­bling his ver­sion of Aaron “Voice” St Louis’ melod­ic Too Own Way he had told his team that “most of the parts I am do­ing this year is love.”

Mar­celle ac­knowl­edged that the song was “a dif­fer­ent feel” from pre­vi­ous se­lec­tions and he treat­ed it as such.

The arrange­ment was no­table for its sus­tained tem­po, melo­di­ous riffs, and thun­der­ous crescen­dos. Ex­o­dus, un­like most oth­ers on the evening, re­lied min­i­mal­ly on props and spe­cial ef­fects, save for its trade­mark moko jumbies all in bright red, and sparkling fire­works at the end.

It was the first win for the now five-time champs in 21 years and Mar­celle’s first vic­to­ry in that cat­e­go­ry at home. Ex­o­dus now boasts wins in 1992, 2001, 2003, 2004, and 2025. This year, it con­sis­tent­ly held lead­er­ship po­si­tion through the pre­lim­i­nary and se­mi-fi­nal rounds.

In the end, Sat­ur­day’s per­for­mance gen­er­at­ed a three-point gap be­tween the band and sec­ond placed bp Rene­gades, play­ing last in the show and un­der the ba­ton of Du­vone Stew­art with Machel Mon­tano’s Bet Meh.

These were two con­trast­ing pre­sen­ta­tions. Stew­art ar­rived on stage to ex­cit­ed ap­plause sar­to­ri­al­ly dressed atop a white horse. When he dis­mount­ed and the cue to be­gin was sound­ed, the 13-time win­ning or­ches­tra, dressed in white with gold­en vests, went in­to a fine­ly tuned ren­di­tion of the song that moved to dance an over­flow­ing au­di­ence that had re­mained in place as mid­night ap­proached.

The per­for­mance earned them 285 points and a two-point lead over third-placed Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um Skif­fle which played eighth in the line­up and de­liv­ered Voice’s nos­tal­gic but ex­u­ber­ant 2024 com­po­si­tion ‘Retro.’

The San Fer­nan­do out­fit pro­vid­ed thrilling mo­ments with an An­dre White arrange­ment and an­i­mat­ed play­ers in sailor suits, caps, and red ban­danas. Spo­ken word po­et, Der­ron Sandy, de­liv­ered a high cal­i­bre pre­sen­ta­tion of his own in in­tro­duc­ing Skif­fle and the theme.

One point away was First Cit­i­zens Su­per­novas which was sec­ond on the evening’s line­up, fol­low­ing Phase II Pan Groove. When they launched in­to the first notes of Kes the Band’s Co­coa Tea it was clear the au­di­ence was about to wit­ness the con­tin­u­a­tion of a keen com­pe­ti­tion that had seen the Lopinot steel­pan or­ches­tra dogged­ly oc­cu­py space among the top three.

Band leader Am­rit Sama­roo pulled out all stops with a bright

Con­tin­ues on page 7

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but chal­leng­ing arrange­ment of one of the com­pe­ti­tion’s most pop­u­lar songs. Singer, Kes Di­ef­fen­thaller pro­vid­ed sup­port up front, flag in hand.

Ear­li­er, Phase II, had been giv­en the un­en­vi­able task of play­ing first - 20 min­utes in­to a sched­uled 7.00 p.m. start. It was clear that the Len “Boogsie” Sharpe arrange­ment of Olatun­ji’s Pan and So­ca, with min­i­mal on­stage the­atrics, was meant to leave a last­ing mem­o­ry.

One point be­hind on the score­sheet were Nu­trien Sil­ver Stars and T&TEC Trop­i­cal An­gel Harps both on 280. Sil­ver Stars played an Ojay Richards/Kersh Ram­sey arrange­ment of Too Own Way while Trop­i­cal An­gel Harps de­liv­ered a live­ly ver­sion of Co­coa Tea, as arranged by Clarence Mor­ris.

Massy Trinidad All Stars – com­plete with more than the evening’s fair share of – played Bet Meh as in­ter­pret­ed by Leon “Smooth” Ed­wards.

Ed­wards had ear­li­er told T&T Guardian there would have been “no un­nec­es­sary fan­fare with some­one con­duct­ing the judges.” Play­ing in fifth po­si­tion with Rene­gades to come much lat­er in the pro­ceed­ings with the same song, the band ap­peared to have at­tempt­ed to tease and out­do Rene­gades’ semi­fi­nal dra­mat­ics. It earned All Stars eighth place in the stand­ings.

Shell In­vaders and RBC Re­demp­tion Sound Set­ters were con­trib­u­tors to the sec­ond tie of the evening—both with 277 points, two adrift of the All Stars tal­ly.

In­vaders played a stim­u­lat­ing in­ter­pre­ta­tion of Bla­ka Dan’s Bless­ing, and few would have bet against a lead­er­ship po­si­tion for the or­ches­tra af­ter they played in third po­si­tion.

RBC Re­demp­tion Sound Set­ters fol­lowed Ex­o­dus on the pro­gramme but could not sus­tain the high en­er­gy gen­er­at­ed by the evening’s win­ners.

Its adap­ta­tion of the Lord Kitch­en­er clas­sic, Flag Woman how­ev­er sus­tained the be­lief that the event had pro­duced as keen a Panora­ma en­counter as has ever been wit­nessed.

“Smooth” Ed­wards’ ad­mo­ni­tion to his All Stars crew seemed to hold for all com­peti­tors: “This is,” he said, “the band joy­ful­ly ex­press­ing our con­tri­bu­tion to re­ward pa­trons for their pa­tron­age to the cul­ture.”

RE­SULTS

1. Re­pub­lic Bank Ex­o­dus, Too Own Way – 288 points

2. bp Rene­gades - Bet Meh, 285 points

3. Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um Skif­fle – Retro – 283 points

4. First Cit­i­zens Su­per­novas – Co­coa Tea – 282 points

5. Phase II Pan Groove – Pan and So­ca – 281 points

6. Nu­trien Sil­ver Stars – Too Own Way – 280 points

6. T&TEC Trop­i­cal An­gel Harps – Co­coa Tea – 280 points

8. Massy Trinidad All Stars – Bet Meh – 279 points

9. Shell In­vaders – Bless­ing – 277 points

9. RBC Re­demp­tion Sound Set­ters – Flag Woman – 277 points