Seaside Serenaders shines a light on Cocorite

Cocorite has a new light – a steelband.

The Cocorite Seaside Steel Orchestra was its president Nigel Balkissoon's vision on how to help the community when he returned from the US.

He first thought of starting a band when he lived there, working as a truck driver.

¨The band came into existence roughly two years ago, but I always had dreams for a little steelband in the community. When I came back to Trinidad, I noticed the guys were on the block with nothing to do.

"So I decided to form the steel orchestra. The guys would now have something else they can do. I threw it out to a fella named Gene Toney. He is a cultural ambassador. He has a dance group called the Cocorite Ujamaa Folk Performers.¨Toney is the artistic director of Ujamaa Folk Performers, which he started on November 20, 1973. His wife Rosanna joined him in expanding the group. Since then they have won several international and regional titles and performed at some of the world's biggest cultural festivals. Ujamaa is a Swahili word for brotherhood or extended family.

Like Toney, Balkissoon felt it was important to work with the community's young people.

"I wanted to concentrate more on the youths and them. Let me tell you. When I was living abroad, I worked night and day as a truck driver to make the money to buy the instruments and send them down. I now work as a taxi driver in Trinidad.

"The first set of instruments I sent was a drum set, tuba, congas, and an entire rhythm section."

He also approached arranger Cary Codrington of the Codrington Pan Family for advice.

¨I needed some guidance so I also went by Mr Cary Codrington and got him to make some tenor and six bass steelpans. I got plenty of assistance from him. He was giving me all the ideas on how to go along this journey.¨

Balkissoon has also helped schoolchildren, buying two computers for Cocorite Government Primary School. During the last Christmas season, the the band gave out 12 hampers to children to ease some of the challenges of the covid19 pandemic.

Although the NCC is staging a Taste of Carnival, which includes steelband shows at the Queen's Park Savannah, where single pan and small bands performed, Seaside Steel spent the season more focused on practising, getting the community involved.

"Our focus is to ensure that everything gets off the ground properly. While we had to stop our practise session at the community centre, we are still practising elsewhere. We really want to prepare for 2023 (Carnival) but should performances come before that, we are aiming to be prepared for it. Any activities done by the band including our fundraisers should be in the newsletter we created for the community. In total, we have about 15 pans and we're looking for more.

"We are extremely grateful to Stuart Brothers, Peakes, Jimmy Aboud and Hardware & Stockpile for Everybody, for partnering with us to achieve some of our goals."