- - Spotlight

Too-simpleceremonymarks TonyWilliams' 70thBy TERRY JOSEPH

historian Oscar Pile was among a pitiful-small crowd of pan enthusiasts who turned

up at the Nepaul Street, St James home ofthe legendary Anthony "Tony" Williams, to helphim celebrate his 70th birthday on Sunday last.

Williams, who lives in a sturdy but unfinishedhouse he built with his own hands back in the70s, was coherent but dispassionate about theevent, chatting casually as if it were just anotherday.

Among the larger excitements was theshenanigans of a colourful and verbose drunkard,who kept up a commentary from the front yard,even as Scrunters Pan Groove, a single pan band,played its repertoire nearby.

There was a sumptuous meal and beer to behad, but the evening never looked anything like atribute to one who, most pan aficionados agree,was among the greatest contributors to the devel-opment of pan.

Williams was presented with the promise ofbirthday gifts, as the plaque organised for himhad not been retrieved from its manufacturers ontime and an enlarged picture of him as a memberof the historical Trinidad All Steel PercussionOrchestra (TASPO) of 1951 was yet to be framed.

Wlliams, who took no more than sixnonths of formal music lessons, went ono become a composer from as early as

1956, writing exclusively for the steel orchestra.In 1974, he penned the famous "Pan Down FifthAvenue" as a memorial of a tour to New York bythe prize-winning Pan Am North Stars, which heled to victory at both the annual Panorama andbiennial music festivals held here.

His work with North Stars on "Voices ofSpring" and "Poet and Peasant" are still part oflocal pan chat, as are his achievements in pre-senting the steel orchestra itself.

Williams is credited with the invention of theSpiderweb pan, the first attempt to locate thenotes in the fourths and fifths sequence. He alsointroduced the double-cello and put pans on

^'wheels and arranged them in clusters on panstands he designed.

He performed with celebrated Trinidad-bornpianist Winnifred Atwell, delivering the Ivory and

ipotlight^ tt c'i

TONY WILLIAMS (right) displays his Spiderweb invention to Herman "Rock"Johnson.

Steel album that remains a collectors' item.Last month, Williams was honoured by

the St James Community ImprovementCommittee with a plaque and a $5,000cheque, a sum immediately matched by PanTrinbago, the umbrella body for the instru-ment and its players.

At Sunday's party, it would have beennice to see some more of the pan legendscoming out to share the moment withWilliams who, throughout his life, remaineda humble man.

It would have been appropriate too, tohave an orchestral pan sound, rather than asingle-pan band, given Williams' discoverythat pan-round-the-neck could not deliversophisticated chords, hence his determina-tion to change that style.

All the same, Williams looked all set tocelebrate quite a few more birthdays, as hetook a bow to the cheer that arose when hecame into the yard for the simple ceremony.