The New Musician

“The reality is that we do have to eat as well,” he states.

Still caught in the era of the stage performer, the music industry in Trinidad and Tobago has

now formed a bottleneck - many people vying for one ground - the stage. But Navid Lancaster many years before, recognised that music simply didn’t mean just stage performances.

“See, I quickly realised that you can put music in anything. So I started attending conferences

that had nothing to do with music. And that’s how I got into Anime Caribe. I had just

gone to market myself.” It’s as simple as that. The business of music is an infant field here

in Trinidad and Navid Lancaster can very well be one of its pioneers. Lancaster’s early love of music manifested itself at age five when he remembered listening to the songs of Styx, particularly ‘Babe’ and George Benson’s version of ‘The Greatest Love of All’, both songs that he learnt by heart. His ear caught the sounds of instruments as well that captivated him. The

violin remains one such.

“It was entirely by chance that I ended up in film,” Lancaster said.

Highly doubtful, Lancaster’s career thus far had shown evidence of his drive to follow his musical calling. It was one that had allowed him to identify areas which needed to be tapped into.

“People say it’s difficult to make a living through music. While in this economy it is, it isn’t impossible.” What follows after Buck, would be a series of films that won numerous awards for which Lancaster served in the capacities of music producer, music editor and composer.

Among them Jab In The Dark (2013) - Winner of People’s Choice Award. Best Short.

TT FF - Navid Lancaster (Film Composer).

Pan: Our Music Odyssey (2014) - Multiple Award Winning Feature Film / PBS Broadcasted - Navid Lancaster (Technical Assistance).

Pan: Our African Odyssey (2015) - Winner of Best T&T Feature Length Documentary.

TT FF - Navid Lancaster (Music Editor / Sound Mixer).Tomb (2016) - First ever feature length Science Fiction film shot entirely in T&T - Navid Lancaster (Music composer of the launch sequence in the film) and ‘The Old Higue’ Trailer (2016) - Collaboration of three countries.

(GAN - Guyana Animation Network / SAN - Suriname Animation Network and music composed by Navid Lancaster).

It’s no surprise that he can say with conviction that “If you want your film to win an award, it has to pass through my hands first.” Lancaster’s drive to tap into markets that others are not focussing on has led him from genre to genre, from recording pan, to music for mobile apps and video games.

His latest is Banana Boat - currently seeking crowd-funding - an animation film for children where he will work as music producer and sound designer.

If he were to advise young producers, Lancaster says, “Listen to a lot of music from different cultures. It’s the only way to expand your brain. Once you start doing that, your brain will climb out of that box of 4/4 rhythms, bacchanal music, dead on Ash Wednesday kind of music. Go to musicians who actually play their instruments and question them about the instrument. Get some grounding in the actual reality of it. Even if you work with samples, instead of downloading sample packs, you can record the actual instruments so you can do your own samples.

At least you then have some connection with what you are creating.

You are trying to create something out of nothing.

“And truth be told, all of us borrow from the past anyway. Nothing works in a vacuum.” Navid Lancaster’s work is evidence of his openness to various genres and constant interaction with the latest happenings in the music industry. He exemplifies the new, technology- age musician, one who moves between stage and technology, between the real world and the virtual world.

Even in the Internet, social media age, to be a producer, “if you can’t relate to people, your music is not going to be heard. It takes a lot of practice and a lot of failure. But it is still the end user, the listener, who puts value to your work.” Navid Lancaster’s work can be viewed and heard on his website www.lancastltd.com.

Search for it and enjoy the layers of music from this very versatile music producer/sound designer.