La Horquetta tops Single Pan semis

Pan Groove had a good thing going with Gregory Ballantyne’s "Party Time" which was arranged by Duvonne Stewart.

The La Horquetta group topped the semis in tallying 280 points. In all, 13 bands qualified for the finals.

The show which was slated to start at 6 pm, ran an hour and a half late after it was moved from City Hall (because of last week’s fire along Frederick Street) to Victoria Square. The competition ended during the early morning hours yesterday.

However, pan lovers did not mind the delay which seems to be part and parcel of every Carnival and they were treated to pan music of the highest quality from the 32 bands.

Placing second was Trinidad and Tobago Defence Force with 272 points earned with the Calypso Rose’s remix of ‘Tempo’ arranged by Len "Boogsie" Sharpe.

San Juan East Side Symphony placed third with 260 points and also played ‘Tempo’ which was arranged by Ken ‘Professor’ Philmore who was the arranger behind joint fourth placed band Pan On The Move, which shared fourth place with Peake Yacht Services Scrunter Pan Groove.

The final band to play was Shades In Steel which took ninth position with 250 points from a Kenneth Guppy arrangement of "Come With It" sung by Black Stalin.

The fact that over half of the pannists were young people seems to indicate that the future of pan appears to be in good hands.