BERTIL ST CLAIR
Pan Player
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   Bertil St Clair is very well known as an excellent football coach; but long before [this he] was one of the top pannist in Tobago.

   Bertil has always been associated with the band Our Boys and in fact started plying the instrument at age 13. He was motivated by [the band] Rhythm Tigers. This band played opposite where he lived on Fenfield Street [in] Scarborough.

   He has been a long outstanding friend of Pat Arnold who captained Our Boys for many a year.

   Bertil St Clair was the President of the steelband movement in Tobago between the years 1976-1980 and took over the captaining of Our Boys when Pat Arnold left for North America.

   He took part in the 1962 Musical Festival and played the selection Sleeping Beauty Waltz. In the 1966 Steelband Music Festival Our Boys took part again but was the [one and] only band to take part in the preliminary round in Tobago.

   Bertil made overseas tours [with the band] mainly in the Caribbean to Grenada, Barbados and St Vincent.

   Our Boys had its best ever year in 1974 when the band won the [Tobago Zonal] Panorama with the selection Bassman by Shadow.

   Over the past twenty years or so, Bertil [has] no longer [been] associated with steelband and has attributed this to his football coaching prowess and the fact that the sponsorship for steelband[s] in Tobago [remains] very difficult. He indicated that to re-equip a band is very costly.

   Bertil St Clair, a panman of yesterday whose contribution to the steelband movement will never be forgotten.

© 1997 Gideon Maxime: Pg 221; PAN THROUGH THE YEARS (1952 - 1996)
© 1998: tobagojo@gmail.com - 19980318 - 1m20071228 - 2m20140615
Historic Update: 04 December 1999; Last Update: 19 July 2014 03:30:00 TT
Processed by: Jeremy G de Barry
Back to Ref: Bertil St Clair. Pan Player

Compiled & Processed by Islands Research for:
The Steelbands (Pan) of Trinidad & Tobago
http://www.seetobago.org/trinidad/pan/panpeep/pp35.htm


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