Gone But Not Forgotten: Pan Pioneers Rare Film Clips by Ray Funk

As part of the Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival at Carifesta, Ray Funk will be presenting a celebration of Pan Pioneers  who have passed away. This free event will focus on Ellie Mannette, Kim Loy Wong, Cliff Alexis, Pat Bishop, Ken “Professor” Philmore, Clyde Bradley and Jit Samaroo, several of who passed in 2018.

This free event offers rare clips of interview of these pioneers and performances by Invaders, Despers, Renegades and more. It will be presented twice, on Saturday August 17th, 6:30 at the Couva Joylanders Panyard and Sunday August 18th, 4:30 pm at the Academy for the Performing Arts Room 1 in the UTT part of NAPA in Queen's Park South.

This latest program is his desire to offer in one event to let his audience hear and see these pioneers of pan talk and have rare clips of pan in concert, festival, and on the streets at Carnival.  “I want to offer in this event rare performances of steelpan but also let the history of pan unfold from the voices of the icons who contributed to its history.” The clips come from various films, television and private sources. They are primarily from Ray Funk’s own collection with assistance from Christopher Laird of Banyan Archives and Timmy More Visual Arts and Production.

Ray Funk has done a number of previous presentations for the Trinidad and Tobago Film festival. of historic film clips on Trinidad Carnival, calypso, pan and mas A retired Alaskan trial judge , Funk has been coming to Trinidad regularly for over two decades primarily during carnival.  He has written dozens and dozens of articles for all three Trinidad daily newspapers, co-written books on Invaders and Northern Illinois Steelband, and been a Fulbright US scholar.

These events are free but tickets are needed and are available as explained on the Film Festival website.

https://ttfilmfestival.com/news/ttff-news-and-features/ttff-19-festival-basics