GUILLERMO ANTONIO
PROSPECT
MR. PROSPECT
PASSES THE BATON
By Terry Joseph
Sunday Express
Section 2
May 7, 2000
Page 36
The more predictable memories of Guillermo Antonio Prospect will
conjure up the magical conductor who transformed the image of the Police Band.
Until
his intervention, the band largely confined itself to the performance of
military marches, deviating only for sporadic Sunday evening public concerts,
or when required for high-level Sate functions. From early in 1964, the new bandmaster changed all that.
But
where Mr. Prospect shook his baton to even greater and more lasting effect was
in the service of indigenous music, most notably the calypso art form and the
steelband movement. In fact, outside of
the police band, Mr. Prospect's baton was evidently more of a magic wand.
Fondly
known as Anthony (the English version of is middle name), Mr. Prospect came to
wide public attention, when he was appointed bandmaster of the Police Service Orchestra,
a responsibility that, for the first time, was being entrusted to a local
musician.
The
diminutive Mr. Prospect (and he was always referred to with full handle) was
soon to make an indelible mark on the history of indigenous music, even as he dutifully
attended to the dominant military component of the Police Band's repertoire.
In
1964, conducting the normally staid orchestra, he bravely pioneered the fusion
of calypso music and military rhythms, premiering the revolutionary concept at
a most unlikely forum. After a
prolonged drum roll, Mr. Prospect lifted his baton, raised eyebrows and
simultaneously lowered spectator inhibitions, by selecting Kitchener's
"Mama, Dis is Mas" and rearranging it for use in the march off at the
Independence Day Parade at the Queen's Park Savannah.
"Mama,
Dis is Mas" was the same calypso that had captured that year's Road March
title and also gave the North Stars Steel Orchestra its second consecutive
Panorama victory. Spectators, who lined
the streets from the savannah to the St James Police Training School, were
therefore able to participate on the sidelines of the parade and in a way that
had not been hitherto possible; when European military marches were used
exclusively, up to today, the style has been maintained by all bands
participating in the annual parade.
Mr.
Prospect LRSM, ARCM, LTCL, A Mus., LCM; used the integrity of his substantive
position to forge respect for calypso as a legitimate music and would later
extend his reach to embrace the steelband movement, in a way that inspired a
new level of respect for pan.
Since
1951, he had been appointed an adjudicator at the prestigious biennial Music
Festival and was thereafter considered the ultimate authority in pan matters at
that level. In 1963, he became the
first local musician to graduate from the Royal Military School of Music at
Knellar, where he won the trophy for Best Conductor and majored as an
ethnomusicologist, with emphasis on the steelband and folk music.
As
early as 1964, he formed the first police steelband and for the 1966 edition of
the music festival, he composed the first test piece for pan, "Intermezzo
in E Flat".
In
the following year, he was immortalized in calypso by The Mighty Sparrow, in a
celebrated piece titled "The Governor's Ball", but which became more
widely known for its chorus tag-line: "Shake Your Baton Like Mr.
Prospect". Sparrow had managed to
tie in a risqué motif in the tribute to Mr. Prospect and those who had not
known him before took every opportunity thereafter to see Mr. Prospect actually
shake his baton.
He
was appointed musical director and arranger of he Casablanca Steel Orchestra in
1972 and three years later wrote another widely revered test-piece for the
steelband, "Maracas Bay", a song still in the repertoire of the
Samaroo Jets Steel Orchestra. While
associated with what was the oldest steelband in continuous existence, Mr.
Prospect created the first pan theatre and wrote the first full-length movie
score (for the film The Right and the Wrong), which included pan music.
In
1978 he produced a long-playing album for the Renegades Steel Orchestra, after
touring South America with the band and was selected in 1981 to function as
musical director and conductor to the Witco Desperadoes Steel Orchestra for
their famous English tour. In between
(1980), he helped Casablanca earn a standing ovation for the band's rendition
of the "Zampa Overture" at the inaugural Steelband Music Festival, at
the Jean Pierre Complex in Port of Spain.
But the band could only cop second place.
Perhaps
the highlight of his career as a hands-on arranger and conductor for the steel
orchestra, came with Casablanca's victory at the music festival in 1982, when
the band's rendition of Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" earned such
acclaim, that it led to tours of London, New York and Switzerland.
"I
think it would be fair to say that he Trinidadianised official State functions
with a wave of his baton in a way that no one else did," said Pat Bishop,
a senior musician widely acknowledged as pan's First Lady. "It was really quite significant,
because up until then we would have been listening to the work of European
composers for the march off; although such music had little to do with us.
"His
initiative made the State occasions indigenous," Bishop said, "but he
did not stop there. He was one of he
first to actually write down music for pan, having composed 'Maracas Bay'
specifically for those instruments and since he had a device that was able to print
music, he was also a serious pioneer in that field.
"Mr.
Prospect's association with the steelband was just not as an arranger of
complex festival pieces. He also did
songs for Panorama and in fact, just about anything that he put his hands to,
worked and worked well. He didn't
always win but, in a broader sense, he never could lose. Of course everyone would remember him for
transcription of the full 17 minutes of Tchaikovsky's '1812 Overture'.
"Indeed,
we had never heard anything like that before and there is a good chance that we
may never hear anything like it again," Bishop said. "He used the sponsorship of the band to
good advantage, at a time when sponsors simply used to fling money at
steelbands and hope that the players would behave. The success of Casablanca under his musical direction showed that
a sponsored band also had a responsibility to deliver quality performances.
"His
work therefore was pivotal in a number of respects. We can now look back and see that Mr. Prospect understood the
wider implications and would work to pull a performance out of the most
unpromising material or circumstances, utilizing a sense of theatre in the
execution," Bishop said.
Mr.
Prospect retired as police bandmaster in 1982, at the rank of Superintendent
and was replaced by George Scott.
During the 1990s, Mr. Prospect functioned as steelband consultant to the
Inter-Cultural Music Institute (CIMI), a project mounted jointly by the
University of the West Indies and the United National Development Programme, to
do music notation for the steelband from major pan events, including Panorama
and the Music Festival.
He
was of major assistance to steelband development in North America too, becoming
first choice as chief adjudicator at Panorama competitions for the various
Carnivals held there. Up to last October,
he functioned in this capacity at the Miami Carnival.
When
we spoke, he looked his normal well-groomed and sprightly self and said that he
was "feeling okay and holding on."
Mr. Prospect died on Wednesday at a hospital in Miami, Florida. He was 77.
(Composed and sung
by The Mighty Sparrow, 1967)
Verse
One:
The
Governor had a ball
Ah
never see nothing so yet
Ah
mad woman jump de wall
And
invade de fete
Prospect
with he baton in hand
Conducting
the police band
He
say the woman shake she waist
In
de Governor face.
Chorus
One:
Telling
everybody inside de place
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect
Ah
couldn't believe that the woman was so boldfaced
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect
Bawl
and shake it up again, shake it up again, Mamayo!
Shake
your baton like Mr. Prospect
Calypso,
calypso Maestro!
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect.
Verse
Two:
Mr.
Prospect stop the band
But
that was a big mistake
Because
now the mad woman
Wouldn't
give him a break
She
say if you won't conduct
This
band it is your hard luck
Now
fellows one, two, three
Follow
me!
Chorus
Two:
That
is how ah like to hear music play
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect
And
if you see how the mad woman break away
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect
Fa
so la te do
Do
re me fa so la te do
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect
Piano
man, leh mih hear you blow
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect.
Verse Three:
The
Governor tell the guard
Put
this lunatic outside
The
woman is really mad
And
she should be tied
When
the soldier make he move
She
say wha' yuh trying to prove
I'm
only having fun
Attention!
Chorus
Three:
Now
behave yourself and do as I say
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect
About
turn, the soldier turn 'round and walk away
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect
Listen
soldier boy
Leh
me stay and enjoy the Governor's ball
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect
Mr.
Prospect, don't stop at all
Shake
yuh baton like Mr. Prospect.