Skiffle sends global message of healing

RESEARCH shows that the use of music as a tool for spiritual healing and social bonding amid diseases has long been a tradition, stretching back through the Black Death in the seventh century (BC).

As the world adapts to the “new normal” in the 21st century, during the coronavirus pandemic, music is still being used to bring healing and messages of hope in the midst of fear of this contagion which has infected over three million worldwide and caused many deaths.

In TT artistes are doing their part, through music, to help people across the globe cope under current stay-at-home regulations.

One of the latest music videos to have emerged on Sunday came from CAL Skiffle Steel Orchestra which launched a cover version of Stalin’s evergreen, We Can Make It If We Try.

The 86 seconds video which features 29 players from TT, USA, Canada and England, crossed 45,000 likes and shares on the first day it was launched on Caribbean Airline’s (CAL’S) Facebook page and 24,000 on Skiffle’s page.

Among the players featured on the double seconds, is Tara Baptiste, an English-born nurse of Trinidadian parentage. Baptiste has been coming to TT for the past eight Carnivals to play with Skiffle at its Coffee Street, San Fernando panyard. She is one of the frontline workers performing yeoman service as a haemodialysis nurse at the Royal Free Hospital, London, working with patients infected with the coronavirus. She was redeployed from her former position as a nurse treating with lupus patients.

Member of Skiffle’s management team, San Fernando mayor Junia Regrello, who is seen waving a flag in the video, said two weeks ago CAL approached them with the idea and the band immediately bought in.

He said he suggested the original Carlysle “Juiceman” Roberts arrangement of the song which was done for the Skiffle and Stalin concert many years ago and which has been part of its repertoire ever since. Juiceman is the arranger for Stalin and Roy Cape.

Regrello said the song was selected, “because it carries a TT message. It carries a global and positive message. When we speak of TT making it, it has nothing to do with ethnicity or political affiliation.

The song calls for a collective approach, of what we can do as a people, what we can do as a nation and internationally as a band. It says we are all in this together.”

Within one week of the idea being put forward, one of the co-captains and Regrello’s son, Joshua Regrello, was sending the arrangement and instructions to players across the globe to collectively send a message of hope to people isolated in their homes.

He said because they wanted unison, people who played with the band this year and had the 2020 T-shirts were invited to be part of the history-making video.

“We could have chosen anyone, including our many international players but the key thing was the jersey.”

The 29 videos were done individually. They included co-captain Brandon Babb and their arrangers, who all reside in New York, Odie Franklin, Marc Brooks and Kendall Williams; and drill master Josh Qualin also from the USA. The younger Regrello pieced them together.

Help also came from Kyle Phillips of Badjohn Republic who mixed and mastered the audio.

Within a week the work was done and last Sunday morning, at 8 am the video was launched, sparking new love and appreciation for the pan and calypso and resilience of the people of TT who continue to send positive vibes even as world economies take a hit.

Regrello commended his son for putting the project together in record time.

“He sent the music to the USA, Canada, Chaguanas, England, Port of Spain, got back the videos and audio edited them and put the video together in a matter of days.”

He said the arrangement was not changed but Joshua was able to get one pannist to play voice and the other the brass lines.

“So you had voice and accompaniment so you did not miss anything.”

Joshua, a law student at the University of the West Indies, St Augustine, said he is very pleased with the response.

“It is important for people to know we can make it if we try. I just feel that is the message that the world need to hear right now.”