Los Paranderos de UWI

Los Paranderos de UWI (University of the West Indies) is a popular Parang group from Trinidad & Tobago. It was originally formed by students belonging to the Spanish Society of the university's St. Augustine campus in 1979. The idea was to expose the student to the art form linked with the language, and to help preserve the Trinidadian Parang tradition. The first-ever performance of the group was at the "Tertulia" organized annually by the Spanish Society, and this performance was a great success, leading to invitations to perform at other social events as well. On one occasion in particular (the Social Sciences fete in '79) so strong was the magic of live Parang music that many students forgot all about the stunned Dj's and their mixes and followed the pioneering Paranderos to the T-Hall to hear more of their sweet sound!

The following year (1980) the group membership became open to all students wishing to take part and so the group "Los Paranderos Universitarios", as it was known in the early days, was officially formed. As the name was kind of long, little by little the group got affectionately known as "Los de UWI" for short and is one of the oldest student groups of the St. Augustine campus.

The group in 1984

Over the years the group has seen many changes in its members - old members have given way to new as they have graduated, passing on also the experience, traditions and songs - as is much the Parang tradition. Some older members however have remained with the group even after graduating and have played an important role in teaching the "rookies" as well as keeping the standards and continuity of the group alive - not always an easy task! It is worth noting that many of those who have been a part of the Los de UWI in the past continue to play important roles in the Parang music scene of Trinidad. Current members of the group are: Rawle Arneaud (cuatro), Desdra Bascombe (percussion), Marlon Belmontes (guitar), Joanne Briggs (PRO, solo vocalist), Miguel Browne (PRC, maracas), Keisha Cruickshank (guitar), Allison Davis (PRC, vocalist), Kathy-Ann Joseph (Treasurer/Secretary, cuatro, vocalist), Sonya Le Maitre (vocalist), Susan Lewis-Leiba (vocalist), Robert Persaud (PRC, vocalist, cuatro, box bass), Camille Renwick (Musical Director, cuatro, vocalist), Angelique Roseman (vocalist), Marvin Ishmael (maracas, boxbass), Marie Therese Lee John (guitar).

Not only have the members changed, so have the songs - In early years there was a heavy emphasis on the San Jose songs (one of the founding members, Ian De Souza, was a member of the group Los Jovenes de San Jose). Today apart from the traditional Parang-tunes, much of the groups repertoire is it's own, composed by the many talented members - including Phillip Allard & Donna-Marie Bertrand ("Nacido"), Donna-Marie Bertrand ("Salve Maria"), Keith Dalip ("Canta"), Teresa Cardinez ("Mil Felicidad") and Sheldon Redhead ("Levanta" and "Recordemos" - the latter with Alan Donawa and Roger Achong).

Last year's (1996) selection of songs Los Paranderos de UWI performed in the competitions represents well the groups current line - One tune, "Santa Maria ", was composed by a member, Robert Persaud (assistance with lyrics by Kathy-Ann Joseph) and another, "El Redentor", was an adaptation with additional lyrics by Camille Renwick. The third song, "Sabaneando", is an old popular classic sometimes referred to as "Cy Cy Cy".

In the early days the group's activities were mainly focused on and around events taking place at the university campus. Not forgetting their home base even today of course, Los Paranderos de UWI has become a popular band and has more engagements outside campus than previously - They can be seen performing at hotels, staff parties of banks and insurance companies, the Brian Lara Promenade, as well as charitable events at the St. James infirmary and L'Hospice - not forgetting the national Parang competitions either. The group has also performed abroad, touring successfully in the Sucre,Venezuela in 1995, performing in Guiria and Rio Caribe, at the invitation of the Venezuelan Parang officials.

Performing in Venezuela

Los Paranderos de UWI started taking part in the various Parang competitions in 1993 and is a member of the NPATT (National Parang Association of Trinidad and Tobago). The past five years have been very successful in competition terms and have firmly established the group in the winner's row among the great Parang groups. 1993 the group took fourth position in the National Parang Competition finals; In 1994 Los Paranderos de UWI placed 3rd. 1995 was the year of the Venezuelan tour and the group did not compete in T&T.

1996 was a great year for the Los Paranderos de UWI - the group took the 1st place in the first ever "Grandfest" in Sangre Grande, organized by the NPATT, and placed 3rd at the national finals in Arima.

This year was not to see the repeat of these magnificent achievements - despite of an excellent crowd reception of the band's energetic and high spirited performance at the NPATT Parang Competition finals on 13th of December, the judges placed the band 7th overall - much to the disappointment and surprise of many. Still, the lead vocalist, Joanne Briggs, obtained the title of "Best Female Vocalist" in the competition. (Cheer up people!!! Better judges next year, says De Complainer!!).

Musicians at play

I had the opportunity to interview some of the members of the group this December and I asked them a few questions concerning Parang music and the Parang-scene in Trinidad - Here's what they had to say...

"We live in a multi-cultural society with many different art-forms and therefore it is to be expected that there would be fusion of various art-forms. With regard to the soca-parang there is a positive aspect in that it was able to get younger people involved in the art-form. Although many persons in the country are able to understand a little Spanish, the language is not used in everyday life and therefore the "English parang" has been more acceptable to the younger generations.

The soca-parang has for the most part retained the structure of parang music. In fact if you play some of the more popular soca- parang tunes on say the cuatro, you would find that you are actually using the same chord structures of the traditional parang tunes. Therefore with the combination of the english lyrics and parang rhythms parang was able to reach more people.

When soca-parang was first sung you would hear songs such as "Hooray Hoorah" and "Ay Ay Maria" by Singing Francine. Such songs still brought the Christmas message to the population. However, in its second phase the lyrics became non-sensical eg Crazy's "Muchacha".

On the negative side, in more recent times the lyrics and topics have deviated from the tradition watering down the art-form. It is quite common to sing on a "paint brush" or "a cork in mih hand" and such other wine woman and song type topics - like calypso lyrics with the double meaning eg Scrunter's "Ah want mih piece a pork " This may be a tradition in itself - but a Christmas tradition? It departs from the tradition and the further you move away from the tradition and the spirit of the tradition you get into danger of loosing the tradition entirely. Because of this recent trend I would have to say that the soca-parang compositions do threaten the art-form."

"This is a very true statement. The fact is that it is extremely difficult to source truly traditional judges. That is, people with the necessary knowledge of both musical and lyrical content who will judge competitions just for the love of it. It may be that they are afraid that they will be called upon too often. Even sourcing UWI personnel who may have done research etc into parang seems to be a problem. Venezuelans seem to be the most accessible for judging.

Judging by Venezuelans can possibly have a negative effect. For example Venezuelans may look at the correctness of the Spanish whereas parang in Trinidad does not necessarily use Spanish syntax. However, this could be a positive change in that if the parang is sung in "correct Spanish" the art-form would have a wider audience.

Some of the better Venezuelan judges even lead us back to the tradition. For example in one competition Clarita Rivas commented that our style was too Venezuelan.

Another negative thing is the fact that there are not many people who are aware of the traditions. Where are the older paranderos who used to parang in the past and who can pass on the traditions to the younger generation?

Even though many of the older paranderos may be able to sing the parang for example, they may not know the tradition that a musician would. They can also find it difficult to pass on the traditions. For example, it is difficult to get the answers to questions such as "What is the distinctive sound of parang? What exactly is sung in terms of tonal qualities and lyrical content? What is the definition of traditional parang"? Many can say "That is not real parang" but cannot identify what quality defines the tradition.

The Venezuelans in T&T are research oriented and generally tend to know their stuff."

"Firstly, it is a fallacy that many people in T&T don't speak Spanish. In fact, many more people than you expect can speak spanish or at least understand some basic spanish. And as time passes this will be even more so since due to our closeness to South America there is increasing trade with Latin America and therefore more and more people are studying spanish. In fact most places that teach Spanish have more applicants than they can handle.

Parang is sung using very simple language - especially traditional parang. And therefore if people actually listen to what is being sung they would for the most part understand. However, many people don't really listen to the words - just the melody and the music. In addition, too many feel that parang is "an old people thing" and therefore they refuse to deal with it.

The problems in terms of popularity is that the younger generations feel that parang is not exciting enough and there is a need to re-introduce the concept that parang is fun."

"Yes. Attempts are being made to do this. Since this will be a first time project for the group - one which we hope to accomplish as early as possible in the next year - do you or any one else out there on the Internet have any suggestions or helpful tips for us? We are not versed in the production of a CD and need to find out what kinds of things we should look out for."

(In fact, you can ALREADY get a CD with one song by Los Paranderos De UWI on it - It is called "Hyarima, the Guardian of Parang" and can be bought safely & quickly online from WWW.AFROBEAT.COM for example).

House Parang at Valsayn

"There are many reasons for this. The reason being how society itself has changed. (1) The society is perhaps not seen or felt as safe as before by the citizens as the crime rates, though certainly low by any international comparison, have still risen somewhat. Thus going around at all hours may worry people more than before. (2) There are economic reasons. In the past when a parang group dropped into a house and sang it would in return be fed. Due to economic conditions people would find it difficult to say feed a group of 15 people who just drop in on them. But then again, pride would prevent you from not feeding them if they did. With this consideration many parang groups have adopted a call in advance approach to say when and how many would be coming lest it would not be affordable to the proposed household. As a result the essence of surprise is gone and some of the spontaneity has in fact been destroyed (although there would be some places that you would know that you could just drop in on). Most parang groups in fact would accept the fact that some households could not afford to feed the group but some people, especially the older folk, have different ideas and pride is a serious thing. In addition, in times gone by you could drop into a house and parang for the 3 or 4 residents. Now, cousin and tante must be invited to participate in the parang party.

"Due respect should be recorded to the art-form. The prize money awarded in parang competions are an indication of the lack of respect. For example, calypsonians winning the calypso or soca monarch may win a car. The first prize for Mastana Bahar is also a car or a prize of that value. The first prize for "Scouting for Talent" is TT$120,000 worth of units and the second prize is a car. Even the prizes for soca-parang competitions are attractive. The largest prize in any parang competition would be from the competition hosted by the NPATT of TT$15,000 if sponsors are available. Parang as steel-pan is often not seen as a respected art-form. It is just background music at some functions rather than a performance worth listening to. It is seen as a second-class item that has been around for a while but came from the small country villages. As a result society does not necessarily see it in its true light."

"The Lara Brothers. That group has in its 50 odd years of existence managed to keep a well recognized standard even among those who don't know/like parang. If you even look at the faces in the group they have not changed much over the years which is astonishing when you take into consideration the problems of getting 10 or 15 people with possibly different opinions to work together for so many years. They are a Vintage group."

"Well, the competition rules stipulate that three songs be played. The first must be an "anunciacion" on the annunciation. The second must be a "nacimiento" ie on the birth of Christ. The third song is a tune of choice and is not judged but gives the judges time to allocate points.

Whereas some groups in the past have sung the same tunes year after year, we have tried to sing at least one new song each year. It is in fact quite difficult to compose new songs year after year on the same topics but in a fresh and new way. We are restricted to the format of traditional parang i.e. hexasylabic 4- line verses etc. Therefore the language is bound to be simple in order to get across the point in few words.

The three tunes that we are singing this year are: Anunciacion - for this song we have used the tune to another quite catchy and energetic song called "Feliz noche Buena" and we have composed our own words. Nacimiento - "La Maravilla" which means literally "The Wonder" but can loosely mean "The Miracle". Both the lyrics and music for this song were composed by Camille Renwick. The lyrics are good and traditional, yet with a slightly different approach to the topic. It is sung in the present tense where as normally these songs are sung in the past tense.

Tune of Choice - "Cantemos a Coro" or in english "Sing the chorus". This is a very old tune and people will know the melody. It therefore has a nostalgic ring although it will be sung in a Los Paranderos de UWI styling."

Q - Any special message to the people reading this / listening to Parang around the world?

"We hope that with this effort some chord has been struck with the message behind the music of parang. Parang is a life-giving tradition. It reminds us of the true meaning of Christmas. It is true that there are people who do not believe in Christ, but Parang reminds us of the hope that the world needs. The lyrics are about sacrafice and of giving.

Some say that the first Paranderos were the shepherds to whom the angels spoke. They heard the news and went to pay homage to the new king. They were so moved that they gave what they had and although they went back to their normal lives they spread the word of Christmas. This is what parang is first and foremost. Paranderos try to bring joy to people even though it may be hard on us. You come out of your normal drudgery and play your part to spread the joy of Christmas. We keep on reminding people of the same message in a form that catches your attention. Paranderos would go to a house without any sort of expectancy in return. It is the tradition that calls you to do this."