Count on the UWI Department of Creative and Festival Arts (DCFA) to deliver, at the height of Carnival music season last Wednesday, an amazing repertoire of mainly classical music performed by leading staffers of the department’s Musical Unit.

Only a top drawer programme could have justified the timing, even as South/Central steelbands battled for a place in the Panorama Semifinals.

The DCFA event passed muster and more.

Kept flowing nicely by MC, Kelly Ramlal who is assistant lecturer in Musical Arts, the programme opened with the pleasing Shankar Roy Bollywood favourite, Kal Ho Na Ho, played by decorated Indian classical violinist/music tutor, Shivanand Maharaj, accompanied on the piano by Andrew Samlal.

The packed UWI Cheesman Building, St Augustine facility was also treated to a lagniappe with Maharaj’s rendition of the dreamy theme from Chariots of Fire.

Then came National Philharmonic founding member and regular on the French horn, management consultant/music teacher, Francis Pau with Mozart’s Concerto for Horn, No. 1 in D Major.

Pau currently teaches horn, oboe and bassoon at the DCFA.

It was not the last of Mozart on the evening. Crowd favourite and Coordinator of the Music Unit at DCFA, Satanand Sharma was next on the piano, playing the Austrian composer’s popular and eminently hummable Sonata in C, K. 545. Allegro.

It was actually the second of his selection on the evening after opening with Bach’s challenging Prelude No. 2 in C Minor from Forty-Eight Preludes and Fugues followed by Chopin’s melodic and show-offy Minute Waltz in D Flat Major But it was Sharma’s Calypso Rag, his own composition, which brought the house down. Calypso Rag tempts consideration of one day offering a version on a Panorama stage. And, why not? Sharma’s second instrument, if he looks at it that way, is the pan, and through his hands have emerged some current leading lights in the steelpan arena.

Speaking of which, pannist extraordinaire, Khion De Las, is a leading musical resource within the DCFA with a first degree from UWI, who, on the evening presented the “world premiere” of Tango Indeciso—a composition that highlights both his skill on the instrument and his ability as a composer/arranger.

On Wednesday, he employed for the “band” version of the song, a brass contingent that helped fill the hall with a remarkable musical moment.

At one point, De Las was on the pan and the snare drum simultaneously.

But all of this was not before former DCFA director, Jessel Murray another crowd favourite joined with young music graduate/ vocalist Christopher Sookhoo for Lily’s Eyes from the 1990s Broadway musical, The Secret Garden.

Martina Chow-Antoine came later on the flute with pieces by Argentine tango composer Astor Piazolla (Tango Etude No. 5) and French pianist/composer Francis Poulenc (Sonata for flute and piano).

Like Pau, Chow-Antoine is a member of the National Philharmonic.

She is the orchestra’s principal flautist. Chow-Antoine was also a section leader with Divine Echoes and is a regular with the Trinidad and Tobago Steel and Brass Symphonic Orchestra’s (TTSBSO) with whom she has also performed as a vocalist.

Raevae Isaac meanwhile produced a hair-raising moment when, for her second selection, she chose the gospel favourite, Because of Who You Are. It was one of those occasions last Wednesday when the lure of a standing ovation was strong. Not that it was any less powerful than the singer’s interpretation of Schubert’s Du Bist Die Ruh, but that the triumphant crescendo at the end of Sandi Patty’s popular Christian paean is best achieved by a finely-tuned soprano of Isaac’s quality.

T&T establishes itself as music territory at this time of year. The DCFA team highlighted a less popular, but equally valuable dimension of the country’s offerings in this area. The packed performance area proved there is a following for this.